Tag Archives: poems

The Critic Who Burned “Fairy-Land”

| May 3, 2016

Editor Nathaniel Parker Willis once burned a manuscript of Poe’s “Fairy-Land.” That seems like pretty harsh treatment from a literary editor; and we wonder why such atmospheric lines as “Dim vales-and shadowy floods- / And cloudy-looking woods” might receive such severe critical feedback? The answer lies in comparing the poem we commonly know with its…

Poetry Inspired by Poe

| April 17, 2009

In case you missed the poetry reading last night at the Poe Museum, we are posting one of the Poe-inspired poems read at the event by J. Ronald Smith, Poet in Residence at St. Christopher’s School. The following poem imagines one of Poe’s 1849 visits to the home of his last fiancee, Elmira Shelton, in…