LETTER–To Edgar Allan Poe

In his let­ter to Edgar Allan Poe, the author address­es the endur­ing and per­plex­ing ani­mos­i­ty towards Poe’s lega­cy, par­tic­u­lar­ly from his con­tem­po­raries and cer­tain ele­ments with­in the Amer­i­can lit­er­ary cri­tique. Despite being cel­e­brat­ed as one of the great­est lit­er­ary fig­ures in Amer­i­ca, Poe is unique­ly dis­par­aged in his home­land, part­ly due to his crit­i­cal role in the lit­er­ary world. The author reflects on the unfor­tu­nate cir­cum­stances that led Poe to become a review­er, argu­ing that such a posi­tion for a man of his tal­ent was lam­en­ta­ble. By offer­ing can­did and often harsh cri­tiques of his peers, Poe alien­at­ed many, includ­ing the minor fig­ures who nev­er for­gave his attacks. This let­ter dis­cuss­es how these actions con­tributed to the long-last­ing defama­tion Poe has suf­fered posthu­mous­ly.

The author sym­pa­thizes with Poe’s strug­gles, high­light­ing the extreme pover­ty and the pro­fes­sion­al chal­lenges he faced, exac­er­bat­ed by his uncom­pro­mis­ing pride. The let­ter also touch­es upon how the lit­er­ary envi­ron­ment has evolved since Poe’s time, sug­gest­ing that Poe might have enjoyed greater suc­cess and recog­ni­tion had he been born lat­er. It empha­sizes the trans­for­ma­tion in the lit­er­ary pro­fes­sion in Amer­i­ca, which now offers respect and rewards that were inac­ces­si­ble to Poe.

Despite his con­tro­ver­sial role as a crit­ic, Poe’s endur­ing lega­cy as a poet and a writer of tales is undis­put­ed. The author dis­miss­es the need to elab­o­rate on Poe’s poet­ry, sug­gest­ing that Poe’s own def­i­n­i­tion of poet­ry as “the rhyth­mic cre­ation of the beau­ti­ful” speaks for itself and per­fect­ly encap­su­lates his work. The let­ter cri­tiques Poe’s exclu­sion of the “didac­tic” in poet­ry, jux­ta­pos­ing his views with the tra­di­tion­al accep­tance of moral instruc­tion in lit­er­a­ture.

How­ev­er, the let­ter acknowl­edges the deep imprint Poe left with “The Raven,” a poem that, despite Poe’s the­o­ry favour­ing vague exal­ta­tion in poet­ry, became his most renowned piece. The author chal­lenges Poe’s aes­thet­ic phi­los­o­phy by com­par­ing it with the uni­ver­sal­ly acclaimed works of Homer and Moliere, demon­strat­ing that Poe’s restric­tive view of poet­ry does not align with the broad­er lit­er­ary canon’s val­u­a­tion.

In essence, this let­ter offers a nuanced reflec­tion on Edgar Allan Poe’s lega­cy, exam­in­ing the com­plex­i­ties of his crit­i­cal recep­tion, the adver­si­ties he faced, and his con­tri­bu­tion to lit­er­a­ture. It empha­sizes the con­tra­dic­tion between Poe’s the­o­ret­i­cal ideals of poet­ry and the broad­er, last­ing appre­ci­a­tion of diverse poet­ic expres­sions.