The Complete Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Including Essays on PoetryPoe, Edgar Allan
General
The Complete Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Including Essays on Poetry
Poe, Edgar Allan
Fantasy poetry, American
In the autumn of 1848 Poe added another line to this poem, and sent it
to the editor of the 'Union Magazine'. It was not published. So, in the
following February, the poet forwarded to the same periodical a much
enlarged and altered transcript. Three months having elapsed without
publication, another revision of the poem, similar to the current
version, was sent, and in the following October was published in the
'Union Magazine'.
* * * * *
3. ULALUME
This poem was first published in Colton's 'American Review' for December
1847, as "To----Ulalume: a Ballad." Being reprinted immediately in
the 'Home Journal', it was copied into various publications with the
name of the editor, N. P. Willis, appended, and was ascribed to him.
When first published, it contained the following additional stanza which
Poe subsequently, at the suggestion of Mrs. Whitman wisely suppressed:
Said we then--the two, then--"Ah, can it
Have been that the woodlandish ghouls--
The pitiful, the merciful ghouls--
To bar up our path and to ban it
From the secret that lies in these wolds--
Had drawn up the spectre of a planet
From the limbo of lunary souls--
This sinfully scintillant planet
From the Hell of the planetary souls?"
* * * * *
4. TO HELEN
"To Helen" (Mrs. S. Helen Whitman) was not published Until November
1848, although written several months earlier. It first appeared in the
'Union Magazine' and with the omission, contrary to the knowledge or
desire of Poe, of the line, "Oh, God! oh, Heaven--how my heart beats in
coupling those two words".
* * * * *
5. ANNABEL LEE
"Annabel Lee" was written early in 1849, and is evidently an expression
of the poet's undying love for his deceased bride although at least one
of his lady admirers deemed it a response to her admiration. Poe sent a
copy of the ballad to the 'Union Magazine', in which publication it
appeared in January 1850, three months after the author's death. Whilst
suffering from "hope deferred" as to its fate, Poe presented a copy of
"Annabel Lee" to the editor of the 'Southern Literary Messenger', who
published it in the November number of his periodical, a month after
Poe's death. In the meantime the poet's own copy, left among his papers,
passed into the hands of the person engaged to edit his works, and he
quoted the poem in an obituary of Poe in the New York 'Tribune', before
any one else had an opportunity of publishing it.
* * * * *
6. A VALENTINE
"A Valentine," one of three poems addressed to Mrs. Osgood, appears to
have been written early in 1846.
* * * * *
7. AN ENIGMA
"An Enigma," addressed to Mrs. Sarah Anna Lewig ("Stella"), was sent to
that lady in a letter, in November 1847, and the following March
appeared in Sartain's 'Union Magazine'.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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