His theory of literary art may be studied in the lecture entitled ‘The Poetic Principle,’ where he maintains that there is no such thing as a long poem, the very phrase being ‘a contradiction of terms.’ A poem deserves its title ‘only inasmuch as it excites by elevating the soul.’ This excitement is transient. When it ceases, that which is written ceases to be poetical. Poe even sets the precise limit of the excitement—‘half an hour at the very utmost.’
He then attacks ‘the heresy of The Didactic,’ protesting against the doctrine that every poem should contain a moral and the poetical merit estimated by the moral. ‘The incitements of Passion, or the precepts of Duty, or even the lessons of Truth, may be introduced into a poem with advantage, but the true artist will always contrive to tone them down in proper subjection to that Beauty which is the atmosphere and the real essence of the poem.’
Poe then proceeds to his definition of the ‘poetry of words,’ which is, he says, ‘The Rhythmical Creation of Beauty.’ Its sole arbiter is Taste. ‘With the Intellect, or with the Conscience, it has only collateral relations. Unless incidentally, it has no concern whatever either with Duty or with Truth.’
In his concrete criticism Poe never hesitated to prophesy. ‘I most heartily congratulate you upon having accomplished a work which will live,’ he wrote to Mrs. E. A. Lewis. Of some poem of Longfellow’s he said that it would ‘not live.’ Possibly he was right in both cases, but how could he know? Here is shown the weakness of Poe’s critical temper. He affirmed positively that which cannot positively be affirmed.
He was a monomaniac on plagiarism, forever raising the cry of ‘Stop thief.’ Yet Poe, like Molière, whom he resembled in no other particular, ‘took his own’ whenever it pleased him to do so, and he was not over solicitous to advertise his sources. He was in the right. If poets advertised their sources, what would be left for the commentators to do? Poe hinted that Hawthorne appropriated his ideas, and he flatly accused Longfellow of so doing. He was punished grotesquely, for Chivers, the author of Eonchs of Ruby, accused Poe (after the latter’s death, when it was quite safe to do so) of getting many of his best ideas from Chivers.
VI
THE POET
Poe’s claim to mastership in verse rests on a handful of lyrics distinguished for exquisite melody and a haunting beauty of phrase. That part of the public which estimates a poet by such pieces as find their way into anthologies regards Poe primarily as the author of ‘The Bells’ and ‘The Raven.’ If popularity were the final test of merit, these strikingly original performances would indeed crown his work. After sixty years, neither has lost in appreciable degree the magical charm it exerted when first the weird melody fell upon the ear. Each is hackneyed beyond description; each has been parodied unmercifully, murdered by raw elocutionists, and worse than murdered by generations of school-children droning from their readers, about the ‘midnight dreary’ and the ‘Runic rhyme.’ But it is yet possible to restore in a measure the feeling of astonished delight with which lovers of poetry greeted the advent of these studies in the musical power of words.
The practical and earnest soul will find little to comfort him in the poetry of Poe. It teaches nothing, emphasizes no moral, never inspires to action. The strange unearthly melodies must be enjoyed for the reason that they are strange and unearthly and melodious. The genius of the poet has travelled
By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,