Selections from the Prose Tales of Edgar Allan Poe

Poe’s character is the most complex which has yet appeared among American writers, and his genius is the most elusive and individual. He fills a very considerable place in our literary development, and yet, in important aspects of his career, he seems to have been entirely detached from it. His genius is no longer questioned, nor is his influence; and yet his impress on the spiritual life of the country is hardly perceptible. Concerning no other American man of Letters has there been such a consensus of critical opinion abroad; concerning no other native poet, save Whitman, have there been such radical differences of opinion at home. He holds a secure place among American writers, but he is in no sense a representative writer: His character and career were deeply affected by the conditions of the time in which he lived; but one looks in vain for any vital expression of the life of his time in his prose or verse. In his criticism, it is true, there is the reflection and imprint of the l