While the question of the appointment was pending, Poe spent some time in Baltimore and there published his second volume of verse, Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and Minor Poems (1829).
The accounts of his life at the Academy are not so divergent as to be contradictory. One classmate noted the youth’s censorious manner: ‘I never heard him speak in terms of praise of any English writer, living or dead.’ Excelling in French and mathematics, Poe by intentional neglect of military duty brought about his own dismissal. He was court-martialled and left West Point on March 7, 1831. He had previously taken subscriptions among his friends for a new book of verse. It was published in New York (1831) under the title of Poems, ‘second edition,’ and was dedicated to ‘the U. S. Corps of Cadets,’ who are said to have been disappointed at finding in its pages none of the local squibs with which the author had been wont to amuse them.
Poe is next heard of in Baltimore, where he seems to have made his home with his father’s sister, Mrs. Maria Clemm, a widow with one child, Virginia. In 1833 ‘The Saturday Visiter’ of Baltimore offered two prizes—one hundred dollars for a story, fifty for a poem. Poe submitted a manuscript volume entitled ‘Tales of the Folio Club,’ and was given one award for his famous ‘MS. Found in a Bottle.’ Had not the conditions of the contest precluded giving both prizes to the same person, he would have received the other award for his poem ‘The Coliseum.’
Through John P. Kennedy, one of the judges in the contest, Poe came into relations with T. W. White, the proprietor of ‘The Southern Literary Messenger,’ published at Richmond. His contributions were heartily welcomed. White then invited Poe to become his editorial associate. The offer was accepted and Poe went to Richmond. Mrs. Clemm and Virginia followed, and in May, 1836, Poe was married to his cousin. A private marriage is said to have taken place at Baltimore the preceding September.
The arrangement entered into by White and Poe was most propitious. The proprietor of the ‘Messenger’ had obtained the services of a young man with a positive genius for the work in hand,—a young man who was able to contribute such tales as ‘Berenice,’ ‘Morella,’ ‘Hans Pfaall,’ ‘Metzengerstein,’ besides poems, miscellanies, and caustic book-criticisms. On the other hand, Poe had, if a small, at least a regular income. He could not buy luxury with a salary of five hundred and twenty dollars, but it was a beginning, and an increase was promised. Moreover, he was in the hands of a man who regarded him with affection no less than admiration. Unfortunately the arrangement was not to last. Poe had become the victim of a hereditary vice.[25] Whether he drank much or little is of less consequence than the fact that after a period of indulgence he was wholly unfitted for work. Once when Poe was temporarily in Baltimore, White wrote him that if he returned to the office it must be with the understanding that all engagements were at an end the moment he ‘got drunk.’ Kennedy explained Poe’s leaving the ‘Messenger’ thus: He was ‘irregular, eccentric, and querulous, and soon gave up his place.’
From Richmond, Poe went to New York, attracted by some promise in connection with a magazine. He lived in Carmine Street, and Mrs. Clemm contributed to the family support by taking boarders. In July, 1838, was published The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. A month later Poe removed to Philadelphia.
He contributed to annuals and magazines and had a hand in a piece of hack-work, The Conchologist’s First Book (1839). This same year he became assistant editor of ‘Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine and American Monthly,’ a periodical owned by the actor, William E. Burton, and held his position until June, 1840. The irregularity and querulousness which Kennedy had remarked led to misunderstandings. How the two men differed in policy becomes plain from a letter to Poe in which Burton says: ‘You must, my dear sir, get rid of your avowed ill feelings towards your brother authors.’ There was a quarrel, and Poe, who had some command of the rhetoric of abuse, described Burton as ‘a blackguard and a villain.’
The year 1840 was notable in the history of American letters, for then appeared the first collected edition of Poe’s prose writings, Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque. The edition, of seven hundred and fifty copies, was in two volumes and contained twenty-five stories, among them ‘Morella,’ ‘William Wilson,’ ‘The Fall of the House of Usher,’ ‘Ligeia,’ ‘Berenice,’ and ‘The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion’.
Poe, a born ‘magazinist,’ cherished the ambition of editing a periodical of his own in which, as he phrased it, he could ‘kick up a dust.’ He secured a partner and actually announced that ‘The Penn Magazine’ would begin publication on January 1, 1841. Compelled to postpone his project, he undertook the editorship of ‘Graham’s Magazine,’ a new monthly formed by uniting the ‘Gentleman’s,’ which Graham had bought, and ‘The Casket.’ From February, 1841, to June, 1842, Poe contributed to every number of the new magazine, printing, among other things, ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue,’ ‘The Mystery of Marie Rogêt,’ and ‘The Masque of the Red Death.’ Griswold succeeded him in the editorial chair. Poe gave as a reason for resigning his place ‘disgust with the namby-pamby character of the magazine.’ In the hope of bettering his fortune, he sought a place in the Philadelphia Custom House, but was unsuccessful.
Notwithstanding frequent set-backs, he had it in his power at any time to attract public notice. In 1843 he won a hundred-dollar prize for his story ‘The Gold-Bug,’ printed in the ‘Dollar Newspaper,’ and he lectured with success on ‘The Poets and Poetry of America.’ But the field was barren and Poe determined on going to New York. Within a week after his arrival in that city (April, 1844) he printed in ‘The Sun’ his famous ‘Balloon Hoax.’ In October he began work on ‘The Evening Mirror,’ Willis’s paper, and on January 29, 1845, ‘The Raven’ appeared in its columns and was the poetical sensation of the day. The next month he lectured on American Poetry in the library of the New York Historical Society. Dissatisfied with the ‘Mirror,’ he accepted a proposition from C. F. Briggs to become one of the editors of ‘The Broadway Journal.’ Later Poe became the sole editor, and for a brief time enjoyed the ambition of his life, the control of a paper of his own. He is said to have doubled the circulation in the four months during which he filled the editorial chair. Unfortunately he lacked capital and could by no means secure it. ‘The Broadway Journal’ stopped publication.