On Edgar Allan Poe

                                                  

Today is the 210th birthday of one of my favorite authors, Edgar Allan Poe.  Of course, I am celebrating in grand style - by reading works of Edgar Allan Poe, wearing my Edgar Allan Poe gear, and studying his fascinating, sad, and somewhat romantic, or at least romanticized, life. 

Pictured above is a quote from Henry Wadsworth Longellow after the death of Poe.  It is found in a book called Edgar Allan Poe: The Strange Man Standing Deep in the Shadows by Charlotte Montague.  In this quote, Longfellow (the man who Edgar Allan Poe probably criticized most harshly of all) praised the genius of Poe and was also sensitive to the reasons Poe was so harsh in his own criticism.  He wrote, "The harshness of his criticism, I have never attributed to anything but the irritation of a sensitive nature, chafed by some indefinite sense of wrong."  I love this quote from Longfellow.  I do not think Longfellow deserved the criticism Poe inflicted upon him.  Longfellow was a talented and sensitive man himself - a man who, obviously, did not hold a grudge.  He also saw something in Poe that was wounded because of the pain he had experienced. 

Poe's life and personality is, perhaps, even more than his genius writing, the reason I have always been drawn to him.  As I wrote in my own social media tribute to him this morning, if I could meet any author, living or deceased, just to chat with and glean wisdom about life and writing from, I would choose Edgar Allan Poe.  I have felt a connection to Poe since I first, in my teens, read his works and studied his life.  Happy 210th birthday to Edgar.