The Poet Edgar Allan Poe: Alien Angel

254 Pages·2014·1.39 MB·English

by  Jerome McGann

The Poet Edgar Allan Poe

The Poet
Edgar Allan Poe
l Alien Angel L
Jerome McGann
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England
2014
Copyright © 2014 by Jerome McGann
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing
Chapter 4 is a composite of two previously published articles:
“Poe. Th e Politics of a Poetry without Politics,” Literature Compass 10, 11
(November 2013): 871–884, copyright © 2013 by Jerome McGann; and
“ ‘Th e Bells,’ Performance, and the Politics of Poetry,” Th e Edgar Allan Poe
Review 15, no. 1 (Spring 2014): 47–58, copyright © 2014 by Jerome McGann.
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
McGann, Jerome J., author.
Th e Poet Edgar Allan Poe : Alien Angel / Jerome McGann.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978- 0- 674- 41666- 6
1. Poe, Edgar Allan, 1809– 1849—Poetic works. 2. Poe, Edgar Allan,
1809– 1849—Criticism and interpretation. 3. American poetry—
History and criticism. I. Title.
PS2642.P63M34 2014
818'.309—dc23
2014011683
Th is book is for J. Gerald Kennedy,
the angel of Poe and American Studies

Contents
Abbreviations ix
Introduction 1
1. Poe In Propria Persona 14
2. Poetics and Echopoetics 70
3. Poetry: or Masks for a Read Death 114
4. Th e Politics of a Poetry without Politics 146
Coda 201
Notes 209
Index 229

Abbreviations
CT Poe, Edgar Allan. Critical Th eory: Th e Major Documents.
Edited by Stuart Levine and Susan F. Levine. Urbana
and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2009.
E Poe, Edgar Allan. Eureka. Edited by Stuart Levine and
Susan F. Levine. Urbana and Chicago: University of
Illinois Press, 2004.
ER Poe, Edgar Allan. Essays and Reviews. Edited by
G. R. Th ompson. New York: Library of America, 1984.
M Poe, Edgar Allan. Marginalia. Edited by John Carl
Miller. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1981.
Mabbott Poe, Edgar Allan. Th e Collected Works of Edgar Allan
Poe. Vol. 1, Poems. Edited by Th omas Ollive Mabbott.
Cambridge MA: Belknap Press, Harvard UP, 1969.
ix