The Unabridged Edgar Allan Poe

1176 Pages·2016·18.1 MB·English

by  Mossman Tam

EDGAR ALLAN POE
January 19, 1809—October 7, 1849
T HE U N A B R I D G ED
EDGAR ALLAN
P OE
Illustrated by Suzanne Clee
Running Press
Book Publishers
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Copyright © 1983 by Running Press.
All rights reserved under the Pan-American
and International Copyright Conventions.
Printed in the United States of America.
This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part in any form or by any
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any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter in
vented, without written permission from the publisher.
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International representatives: Kaiman & Polon, Inc.
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The digit on the right indicates the number of this printing.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data:
Poe, Edgar Allan, 1809-1849.
The unabridged Edgar Allan Poe.
Summary: Includes short stories, poems, and other
works by one of the great American writers.
[1. Short stories. 2. American poetry] I. Title.
PS2602 1983 813'.3 83-16023
ISBN: 0-89471-233-0 (paperback)
ISBN: 0-89471-234-9 (library binding)
ISBN: 0-89471-245-4 (cloth edition)
Interior illustrations by Suzanne Clee.
Cover illustration by Gill Cohen.
Cover design by Toby Schmidt.
Back cover photograph: The Granger Collection.
Frontispiece photograph: The Bettmann Archive.
Typography: Paladium by rci, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Printed and bound by Port City Press, Baltimore, Maryland.
This book may be ordered by mail from the publisher.
Please include $1.50 for postage. But try your bookstore first.
Running Press
Book Publishers
125 South 22nd Street
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103
A WORD FROM THE EDITOR
EDGAR ALLAN POE'S name is now synonymous with horror,
mystery, and the macabre. But as a writer, he is not so easy to
characterize. By turns, Poe was a romantic poet who penned affec
tionate verses to a succession of women—including his mother-in-
law. He also wrote black comedy (for example, "Loss of Breath")
and hilariously tall tales ("The Angel of the Odd"). For "The
Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade," he collected the kind
of astonishing facts that, a century later, would appear in Ripley's
Believe It Or Not. He was a devotee of landscape gardening who
also devoured true-life accounts of exploration and seafaring, until
he was able to concoct convincing ones of his own ("The Journal of
Julius Rodman" and "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym"). He
dabbled in science fiction ("Hans Phaall" and "Mellonta Tauta"). He
used logic, common sense, and a knowledge of human nature to
solve mysteries both in detective fiction ("Murders in the Rue
Morgue" and "The Purloined Letter") and in real life ("Maelzel's
Chess Player" and "The Mystery of Marie Roget"). For good
measure, he also wrote broad farce ("The Spectacles" and "Why The
Little Frenchman Wears His Hand in a Sling"). Even "The Gold-Bug"
turns on a bit of dialect humor straight from the minstrel shows.
Again and again, editors bewildered by Poe's versatility have
printed his poems separately from his stories. It's true that Poe was a
poet first and last: he began his literary career with Tamerlane And
Other Poems and ended it with "The Bells," published shortly before
his death. But in the years between, he switched regularly between
poetry and prose. In this edition, we present his poems and tales
together, in the order that Poe originally wrote them—or, where this
information is unknown, in the order of their first appearance in
print. (That date appears in brackets at the end of each selection.)
Now for the first time, readers can see Poe's creative mind at
work—as, for example, when news of the California gold rush in
spired both "Von Kempelen and His Discovery" and the poem
"Eldorado."
A Note on the Text
Very little of Poe's work exists in a truly definitive form, since
their author made a good deal of his income by selling pieces to
magazines and newspapers. Few periodicals were distributed out
side the cities where they were published. And so Poe—who lived
variously in Boston, Richmond, Philadelphia, New York, and
Baltimore—was often able to sell the same piece to a number of dif
ferent editors. His celebrated poem "The Raven" was reprinted at
least 19 times during his lifetime. Each of his more popular stories
appeared at least half a dozen times, not counting their publication
in book form. And with almost every new printing, Poe made
changes, additions, or deletions—not always for the best, as when
he replaced the evocative title "The Scythe of Time" with the more
pedestrian "A Predicament." Very often, the first version of a poem
or story had a fresh, direct, vivid approach that was obscured in
later changes.
For the text of this edition, we have followed the very first print
ing of each particular work. In the case of stories like "Berenice" and
"The Oval Portrait," this restores several extensive paragraphs that
Poe later deleted. The poems, too (which Poe often amended or
rewrote again and again), are presented in their original published
versions. Each work bears its original title; any later title that Poe
gave it appears in brackets. And since Poe often used similar or iden
tical titles for completely different poems, our table of contents in
cludes the first line of every poem, so that you can see at a glance
which "To Helen" is which.
We've also removed some of the stumbling blocks that hamper
readers of these tales. When Poe began writing, many 18th century
usages were still in vogue: for example, "wo" for woe, "sate" for sat,
and such British spellings as "favour" and "endeavour." We've re
tained most of these once-correct spellings and punctuation to
preserve the original flavor of Poe's work. But we've quietly fixed
obvious misprints and, in keeping with modern usage, italicized the
names of ships, books, and magazines.
Poe tended to sprinkle his stories with quotations in Greek, Latin,
Spanish, German, and Italian—a habit he good-naturedly satirizes
in "The Signora Psyche Zenobia." Much of the action and the entire
punchline of "The Duke De l'Omelette" are given in French. When
Poe doesn't translate such phrases himself, or where their meaning
isn't obvious from the context, we've provided translations in
brackets.
In a few of his poems such as "An Enigma," Poe concealed
women's names, using an acrostic code. For readers unfamiliar with
this literary convention, we have printed the acrostics in small
capital letters to reveal the poems' hidden meaning.
Lastly, we are proud to include a number of little-known pieces
not collected in any other one-volume anthology of Poe's
works—among them, "Lines on Ale," "Desultory Notes on Cats,"
"Morning on the Wissahiccon," "Instinct Vs. Reason," and "Some
Secrets of the Magazine Prison House." And, with the kind permis
sion of the Morgan Library, we present the complete version of Poe's
verse drama Politian, of which only selected scenes were published
during Poe's lifetime.
Here, then, is the full body of Edgar Allan Poe's genius—pre
sented in the way it originally appeared to his readers at the time.
—TAM MOSSMAN
TABLE OF CONTENTS
A Word from the Editor 7
Imitation 17
(A dark unfathom'd tide.. .)
A Dream 18
(A wilder'd being from my birth. ..)
Dreams 19
(Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!)
The Happiest Day 20
(The happiest day—the happiest hour. . .)
Song: To 21
(I saw thee on thy bridal day—)
Stanzas 22
(In youth have I known one with whom the Earth. . .)
Evening Star 24
('Twos noontide of summer. . .)
The Lake 25
(In youth's spring, it was my lot. . .)
Spirits of the Dead 26
(Thy soul shall find itself alone—)
Tamerlane 27
(I have sent for thee, holy friar. . .)
Alone 39
(From childhood's hour I have not been. . .)
To 40
(Should my early life seem. . .)
To the River— 42
(Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow. . .)
Sonnet: To Science . 43
(Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!)
Introduction [Romance] 44
(Romance, who loves to nod and sing.. .)
AlAaraaf 46
(O! nothing earthly save the ray...)
To 60
(The bowers whereat, in dreams, I see. ..)
An Acrostic 61
(Elizabeth it is in vain you say. . .)
Elizabeth 62
(Elizabeth—it surely is most fit. . .)
Alone [To M—] 63
(O! I care not that my earthly lot. . .)
Heaven [Fairy-Land] 64
(Dim vales—and shadowy floods—)
To Helen [ Stannard] 66
(Helen, thy beauty is to me. . .)
Mysterious Star! 67
(Mysterious Star!)
Israfel 68
(In Heaven a spirit doth dwell.. .)
Irene [The Sleeper] 70
('T is now—so sings the soaring moon. . .)
The Valley Nis [The Valley of Unrest) 72
(Far away—far away—)
The Doomed City [The City in the Sea] 74
(Lo! Death hath rear'd himself a throne. . .)
A Paean 76
(How shall the burial rite be read?)
Metzengerstein: A Tale in Imitation of the German 78
The Duke Del'Omelette 87
A Tale of Jerusalem 91
Loss of Breath: A Tale a la Blackwood 95
Bon-Bon: A Tale 110
Serenade 124
(So Sweet the hour—so calm the time . . .)
Four Beasts in One: The Homo-Cameleopard 125
To 132
(Sleep on, sleep on, another hour—)
Fanny 133
(The dying swan by northern lakes . . .)
Ms. Found in a Bottle 134
The Visionary [The Assignation] 244
To One in Paradise 151
(Thou wast that all to me, love . . .)
Berenice: A Tale 155
Morella 164
Hymn 166
(Sancta Maria! turn thine eyes . . .)
Lionizing: A Tale 170
HansPhaalfcATafe 175
To Frances S. Osgood 218
(Beloved! amid the cares—the woes . . .)
King Pest the First: A Tale Containing an Allegory 219
To Elizabeth [To F s S. O d] 230
(Woulds't thou be loved? then let thy heart. . .)
Shadow: A Fable 231
Siope [Silence]: A Fable 234
Politian 238
The Coliseum 267
(Type of the antique Rome! Rich reliquary . . .)
Maelzel' s Chess Player 270
A Review of "Peter Snook" 290
Bridal Ballad 300
(The ring is on my hand . . .)
Sonnet: To Zante 302
(Fair isle, that from the fairest of all flowers . . .)
A Review of Astoria by Washington Irving 303
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket 326
Von Jung the Mystific [Mystification] 469
Ligeia 479
The Conqueror Worm 484
(Lol 'tis a gala night. . .)
Why the Little Frenchman Wears His Hand in a Sling 493
The Signora Psyche Zenobia [How to Write a
Blackwood Article] 498
The Scythe of Time [A Predicament] 506
The Devil in the Belfry: An Extravaganza 514
The Man That Was Used Up: A Tale of the Late
Bugaboo and Kickapoo Campaign 522
The Fall of the House of Usher 532
The Haunted Place 539
(In the greenest of our valleys . . .)
William Wilson: A Tale 549
The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion 566
Silence: A Sonnet 572
(There are some qualities—some incorporate things . . .)
The Journal of Julius Rodman 573
Instinct Vs. Reason: A Black Cat 629
Peter Pendulum, The Business Man 632
Cabs 640