Complete Poems [Paperback]

Edgar Allen Poe (Author), Thomas Ollive Mabbott (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 31, 2000

Although best known for his tales, Edgar Allan Poe himself thirsted for fame primarily as a poet. This volume, assembled by the eminent Poe scholar Thomas Ollive Mabbott, is the single most authoritative edition of Poe's poems ever published: 101 poems and their variants, including such gems as "The Raven," "The Bells," and "Annabel Lee," as well as previously uncollected poems, fragments, verses he published in reviews he wrote, and poems attributed to him. In this exhaustive collection, Mabbott takes a fresh look at these texts, aiming "to present what [Poe] wrote, to explain why he wrote it, to tell what he meant when he wrote it (if that be in any way obscure), and to give a history of its publication." Containing the definitive poems as well as pertinent biographical background, full annotations, and a meticulous enumeration of successive texts and variants, Mabbott's edition stands as a firm foundation for Poe scholarship as well as for more general appreciation.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Epimanes: Triumphal Song Of The Roman Army
Song Of Triumph
'so Let It Be'; To -
An Acrostic
Al Aaraaf
Alone
Annabel Lee
The Bells
The Bells - A Song
The Beloved Physician (fragments)
Bridal Ballad
Catholic Hymn
The City In The Sea
The Coliseum
The Conqueror Worm
Deep In Earth
The Divine Right Of Kings
The Doomed City
A Dream
A Dream Within A Dream
A Dream Within A Dream, Or Imitation
Dreamland
Dreams
Eldorado
Elizabeth
Enigma
An Enigma
Epigram For Wall Street
Eulalie; A Song
Evening Star
Fairyland (1)
Fairyland (2)
Fanny
For Annie
The Happiest Day, The Happiest Hour
The Haunted Palace
Impromptu. To Kate Carol
Introduction
Irene
Israfel
The Lake (version 1)
The Lake (version 2)
Lenore (1)
Lenore (3)
Lines After Elizabeth Barrett
Lines On Ale
Lines On Joe Locke
May Queen Ode; Fragment
Mysterious Star! (a New Introductioin To 'al Aaraaf')
Oh, Tempora! Oh, Mores!
A Paean
Politan; A Tragedy
The Raven
Romance
Serenade
The Sleeper
Song
Sonnet To My Mother
Sonnet: Silence
Spirits Of The Dead
Spiritual Song
Stanzas
Stanzas (to F.s.o.)
Tamerlane (1)
Tamerlane (2)
Tamerlane (3)
Tamerlane (4)
To - (1)
To - (2)
To - (4)
To - (5)
To - (6)
To - (7)
To Elizabeth
To F - (mrs. Frances Sargent Osgood)
To F---s S. O---d
To Helen (1)
To Helen (2)
To Isaac Lea
To M -
To M.l.s.
To Margaret
To Marie Louise
To Miss Louise Olivia Hunter
To My Mother
To Octavia
To One In Paradise
To Science; Sonnet
To The River
To Zante
Ulalume - A Ballad (2)
A Valentine
A Valentine To --
The Valley Nis
The Valley Nis (b)
The Valley Of Unrest (2)
Visit Of The Dead
Oh Lady, Love, Awake!; A Romance
Beautiful Original Poem; To Edgar Allan Poe
Ballade
-- Table of Poems from Poem Finder®

From the Inside Flap

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) is internationally renowned as a pioneering master of the macabre. He is regarded as one of the world's great short story writers as well as a great lyric poet, and is credited with inventing the detective story and the modern gothic horror tale. He has been an important influence on many major American and European writers including William Faulkner, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Baudelaire, H.P. Lovecraft, and William Butler Yeats, among many others.
Poe's poetry, which is collected in this volume, is more personal than his prose. The themes of love, death, and despair which recur throughout reflect the anguish he suffered in his own troubled life. "Annabel Lee" is a haunting lament to his young wife, Virginia, who died of tuberculosis. "The Bells" is an eerie and melancholy meditation which recreates with brilliant musical language the hypnotic, funereal aura of ringing bells. "The Raven" is a comic tour de force in which the protagonist turns his strange visitor into a symbol of his own sorrow and loss. Poe's best poems remain some of the most popular and technically accomplished in the English language.
This book features a deluxe cover, ribbon marker, top stain, and decorative endpaper with a name plate. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 672 pages
• Publisher: University of Illinois Press (August 31, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0252069218
• ISBN-13: 978-0252069215
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #205,285 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful collection of poems, May 7, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Poems (Library of Classic Poets) (Hardcover)

The book "Poems Of Edgar Allan Poe", contains thirty one works by Edgar Allan Poe. Ranging from sonnets of love to personal depiction's and morbid descripive poems. Such selections as "The Raven", "Lenore", "Annabel Lee", "To Helen", and my favorite poem "Alone" are included in "Poems Of Edgar Allan Poe". Poe's poetry is a beautiful display of human nature and emotion. The poetry portrays his abstract look at the world, especially in the poem "Alone" where a sympathetic nature arises in readers from understanding exactly what he poetically writes. With Poe's descriptions of being an odd child during his youth, readers empathize with him and understand his sadness. Give Poe's work a try you may find a strange connection of your own.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Poetry, but No Introduction, Footnotes or Commentary, June 14, 2004

By 

Michael Wischmeyer (Houston, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The complete poems (Hardcover)

The Raven, Annabel Lee, Eldorado, The City in the Sea, and The Bells are commonly found in anthologies, but much of Poe's poetry is not widely read today. I enjoyed this inexpensive introduction (published by Barnes and Noble Books) to Poe's poetry, but I was disappointed by the absence of an introduction, footnotes, and commentary. The poems are apparently arranged chronologically from 1827 to 1840; Poe's best known poems are in the latter half.

Poe's best poetry is marked by creativity and innovation, sometimes unexpectedly transitioning from a theme of love and beauty to one of despair and death. I consider The City in the Sea, The Sleeper, The Valley of the Unrest, The Haunted Palace, The Conqueror Worm, For Annie, and Annabel Lee to be among the best examples of Poe's imaginative, haunting descriptions of death and dying.

Poe's early poetry, and some of his later works, are reminiscent of English romantic poetry. At his own expense Poe printed his first book, Tamerlane and Other Poems (1827). Poe's style in these earliest poems - Tamerlane, Song, Dreams, Spirits of the Dead, Evening Star, A Dream Within a Dream, Stanzas, A Dream, The Happiest Day --- The Happiest Hour, and The Lake - is characterized by lyrical descriptions, flowery language, and romantic themes.

I enjoyed the long poem Tamerlane. Tamerlane (or Tamburlaine, or Timur), a Tartar warrior of the fourteenth century, had amassed an immense empire, and was now reflecting on a distant, but not forgotten, youthful love. Following legend, Poe supposes that Tamerlane was born a lowly peasant, but it is more likely that he was descendant of the famous Khans. (In 1996 the newly independent Uzbekistan celebrated the 660th anniversary of the birth of Timur Khan.)

As in The Raven, Poe often employed refrains in later poems. We see Poe experimenting with this poetic technique in one of his earliest efforts, the lyrical poem titled Song. Spirits of the Dead is a contemplative look at death, not a poem of terror. A Dream Within a Dream questions reality itself.

I had more difficulty with the lengthy, early poem Al Aaraaf. This romantic fantasy portrays a visitation from a distant world "near four bright suns" to our lovely Earth, the home of the "Idea of Beauty".

Two poems, An Enigma and A Valentine, challenge the reader to uncover hidden names within the poetry itself. (They reminded me of Poe's secret code in his mystery The Gold Bug.) I have yet to unravel either riddle.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!, July 15, 2009

By 

E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Complete Poems (Library Binding)

Most people know that Edgar Allen Poe wrote poetry. Of course, you'd be hard-pressed to make them quote a line that doesn't involve ravens.

Well, it's time for some poetry homework -- "The Raven" is neither Poe's most beautiful nor his most striking poem. That is reserved for other, more obscure works in Poe's "Complete Poetry" -- and while one might expect the ghostly or macabre to be all throughout his work, it's also filled with transcendent beauty, wistfulness, and some truly amazing wordwork.

Over his lifetime, Poe tried out many styles -- there are sonnets, short hymns, long rambling odes written in dramatic, vaguely Shakespearean style ("O, human love! thou spirit given/On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!"), acrostics, little exercises in self-reflection, a lyrical song or two, and some haunting stories rendered in verse like the bittersweet "Annabel Lee."

And the content of these poems is just as diverse. Some of them are distinctly dark -- sunken cities, tolling bells, haunted palaces, thoughts on the lingering spirits of the dead, abandoned valleys, and loved ones that have been stolen away by death (" I pray to God that she may lie/For ever with unopened eye/While the pale sheeted ghosts go by!"). And yes, it has the one about a midnight dreary, and a creepy raven with eyes like "a demon's that is dreaming."

And there are a lot of moments of beauty -- lush descriptions of nature, bittersweet dreams, love for a beautiful girl, and elfin odes to those who "put out the star-light/With the breath from their pale faces/About twelve by the moon-dial..." But in many of these, Poe manages to add a melancholy atmosphere -- just look at "Bridal Ballad," whose narrator assures us that she is happy, but who is haunted by the "dead who is forsaken," her former lover.

Yeah, Poe's verse tends to be about as cheerful as his best known fiction, and often with some of the same preoccupations. He was a little less successful in verse at times, as occasionally you get some very strained verse schemes, like the terribly awkward "Eulalie" ("Now Doubt - now Pain/Come never again/For her soul gives me sigh for sigh").

But like his stories, Poe's poems are spun out of exquisite, dreamlike words that can sometimes evolve into nightmares. This guy could evoke everything from ghosts to fairy-tales, brides to wormlike horrors. Even the more sentimental moments have a dark edge ("Oh, may her sleep/As it is lasting, so be deep!/Soft may the worms about her creep!"). And he also wraps his verse in some truly beautiful natural metaphors -- ancient forests, flowers, misty moons, and many other beautiful touches.

And Poe's poetry even allows a window into his own mind at times, most painfully expressed as "from childhood's hour I have not been/As others were -- I have not seen/As others saw -- I could not bring/My passions from a common spring..." and the "mystery which binds me still."

For anyone who can appreciate his exquisite use of words, the "Complete Poetry of Edgar Allen Poe" is a must-read -- full of dark, meditative little gems and exquisite language.