Kathryn Leonarczyk

Dr. Pate

English 301

Annotated Bibliographies

Thesis: Edgar Allan Poe used his environment, and the unfortunate circumstances of his

life to create poetry that can be interpreted in a multitude of ways.

Unrue, Darlene Harbour. “Edgar Allan Poe: The Romantic as Classicist.” International

Journal of the Classical Tradition, vol. 1, no. 4, 1995, pp. 112–119. JSTOR,

JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/30221867.

Springer is an international publishing company who has published over 1,200

journals, in addition to more than 3,000 new books annually. They cover a multitude of

studies including biomedicine, clinical medicine, physics, mathematics, and economics.

The author, Darlene Harbour Unrue, has written numerous books including her most

recent published in 2005: Katherine Anne Porter. In this article, Unrue sheds light on

Poe’s poetry through a classical lens and discusses how classical values aren’t ones that

are readily used when looking at his works. She describes his works as having both

romantic and gothic elements. As she continues, she carefully examines the use of these

elements and how Poe’s work ultimately uses a classical worldwide view. When reading

Poe’s work, there is a common theme of romance, and darkness, which plays directly into

the classical elements that Unrue, talks about. In the classical era, the fine arts, literature

and theater were all changing direction, and if Poe were using a classical worldwide

view, his environment would be directly affecting his work. He started releasing work at
a young age, and as he grew in age, his works portrayed more and more neo-classical and

classical elements.

Quinn, Patrick F. “The Profundities of Edgar Poe.” Yale French Studies, no. 6, 1950, pp.

3–13. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2929190.

George Parmly Day and his wife founded the Yale University Press in 1908. It is

one of the oldest and biggest American University Presses. It publishes work that

contribute to the understanding of humans. The author of the article, Patrick F. Quinn has

written numerous books dedicated to Poe, and the analyzation of his works. In this

article, Quinn’s thesis is that Poe’s writing reflects in the interest of a psychoanalytical

critical theory. He argues that his works will make the most sense when it is assumed that

the work derives from an “infantile oedipal experience.” He also states that his pattern of

life are reoccurring themes throughout his work that only intensifies with his creations.

Quinn also touches on whether or not Poe’s writing is a resemblance of him going in and

out of consciousness. When reading some of Poe’s work, one of the best examples would

be The Raven. Critically thinking, one could view this poem as a slip into a dream. There

are multiple times where Poe says that a raven is saying “nevermore” which is obviously

a vision the narrator of the poem is having. If Poe is influenced by his surroundings and

the negative things that happened in his life, then this would make complete sense. It

could be that Poe used an escape into the unconscious as a coping mechanism to deal

with his surroundings.

Hovey, Kenneth Alan. “Critical Provincialism: Poe's Poetic Principle in Antebellum

Context.” American Quarterly, vol. 39, no. 3, 1987, pp. 341–354. JSTOR, JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/2712883.

Johns Hopkins University Press is one of the largest the in U.S. It publishes books
along with journals that create diversity among scholarly publishers. It

also has one of the largest publication programs. It caters to the arts and humanities

along with technology and medicine. The author, Kenneth Alan Hovey, had written many

articles like this one, in addition to this he was a professor as well as a scholar. In this

article, Hovey uses classical analysis, and argues that the way in which Poe grew up, and

experienced life reflected in his work. He states that Poe’s negative outlook on life shows

up throughout his work. He then talks later about how Poe turns from poetry to writing

his own criticism to influence his writing and Hovey also mentions that Poe believed that

time was against poetry, along with the belief that learning had little to do with the

imagination. When looking at Poe’s work and the themes of most of his work being

romantic or gothic, Hovey is correct. The way Poe grew in his environment impacted his

writings and how he viewed the world. He wrote against the grain of society and created

a world in which readers can get lost. His work embodies struggle, depression, darkness

and mourning, which are all themes of hardships in life. Because of who Poe was as a

person, his writing was a direct representation of his environment.

Whalen, Terence. “Edgar Allan Poe and the Horrid Laws of Political

Economy.” American Quarterly, vol. 44, no. 3, 1992, pp. 381–417. JSTOR,

JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2712982.

Johns Hopkins University Press is one of the largest the in U.S. It

publishes books along with journals that create diversity among scholarly publishers. It

also has one of the largest publication programs. It caters to the arts and humanities

along with technology and medicine. The author, Terence Whalen is a professor of

English at the University of Illinois, and one of his main interests is the life and writing of
Edgar Allen Poe. In this article, Whalen argues that Poe couldn’t neglect his social

environment when writing and viewing the world. He says how at the time Poe was

publishing works, there were many external outliers that were influencing society and the

publishing industry. One example he gave was the invention of the printing press.

Whalen also talks about how most of the time Poe’s work is analyzed through

psychoanalytical theory, where literary critics will question Poe’s mental state of mind

and how they are in tune with his emotions. He also emphasizes that Poe believed in the

connection between culture and political economy. It is clear that through Poe’s writing

he is influenced by his culture and his surroundings. It would be hard to say that no

writer, or just human in general isn’t. our environment makes us who we are, we are

directly influenced by the life we live and the experiences we have. If this is true, then

something that we as a human create would be therefor influenced by how we are as a

person. Whalen makes valid points that it would be hard to not be influenced by your

environment, and it would be difficult as well to not let yourself bleed into something

your write.

Dayan, Joan. “Amorous Bondage: Poe, Ladies, and Slaves.” American Literature, vol.

66, no. 2, 1994, pp. 239–273. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2927980.

Duke University Press publishes more than 100 books and thirty journals yearly,

focusing in the humanities and social sciences. Over the years the press has developed

and become more diverse, adding more journals in the genres of math and law. With

these new areas of writing, it has gained a reputation in the theory of history and cultural

production. The author of the article, Joan Dayan is a professor of English at the

University of Pennsylvania. Dayan’s argument for this article is that Poe’s writing
portrayed signs and themes of racism. She is looking at his work through an African

American critical lens. She gives examples of places where the women in Poe’s works

were interoperated by the Poe Society as “white, elegant and delicate”. Dayan then

argues that the founding members of this society have made it a prevalent theme is Poe’s

other works. She then goes on to say that Poe’s romance can be related to slavery and

servitude. If the argument is that Poe was influenced by his environment, then Dayan’s

article goes to serve this idea. There will always be room to interoperate a text in any

given way. When reading a text, the beauty, and the truth of the text are up to the readers

ideals. Poe was influenced by his environment, but so is the reader. While there is

validity to Dayan’s argument, there is also question as to how each reader is influenced

by the text.

Tate, Allen. “The Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe.” The Sewanee Review, vol. 76, no. 2, 1968,

pp. 214–225. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/27541613.

Johns Hopkins University Press is one of the largest the in U.S. It

publishes books along with journals that create diversity among scholarly publishers. It

also has one of the largest publication programs. It caters to the arts and humanities

along with technology and medicine. The author, Allen Tate was a poet, from Kentucky,

who died at the age of 79. He was teaching at University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. In

his essay he writes about Poe’s poetry and how he revised some of it after writing it. He

argues that Poe did this because he was trying to make them better. He argues that the

demons he was struggling with, who he writes about in his poetry, drove him to revise the

work. Tate talks about Poe’s childhood, and how he thinks whatever Poe may have

struggled with then, is linked to the darkness of his poetry. He also talks about Romantic
poets always being alone, and how this helps their art develop. He says that the poets in a

sense need to be alone to write how they do. This essay fits perfectly with the thesis.

Poe’s work is influenced by what he experienced. This is a common theme found in all

humans. The environment we reside in, and the things we experience change us as a

person. This can also be why Poe reflected on his works and revised some; if his

surroundings changed, he might of as well.

Stovall, Floyd. “The Conscious Art of Edgar Allan Poe.” College English, vol. 24, no. 6, 1963,

pp. 417–421. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/373878.

The National Council of Teachers of English is a non-profit organization who

dedicates its time to the education of English. It was started in 1911, and sense then has

created a platform for professionals and teachers to continue and share their education

and works. The author, Floyd Stovall, died in 1991. His works include Edgar Poe the

poet, The Foreground of Leaves of Grass, and American Idealism. In his article, Stovall

categorizes what he says are the six types of people who read Poe’s literature. Those six

would be: the people who just like to read his work, the people who only wish to evaluate

one or two of Poe’s work, those who dislike Poe’s poetry, those who use psychoanalysis

to analyze his work, those who enjoy his work but feel like they should not, and the

people who do not like his work, but feel they need to because of someone else. He also

talks about the revisions that Poe’s work underwent, and how these decisions were made

meticulously, in the form of art. When looking at the thesis of this annotation, it is

interesting to see how his work affects the readers, and not just how it is a reflection of

just Poe, and his experiences. The categories Stovall included were ones of people who

seem to be ashamed to admit that they enjoy Poe’s work. When looking through a
psychoanalytic critical lens, the readers might even have similar problems as Poe, and

might be able to connect to the work more.

Runcie, Catherine A. “EDGAR ALLEN POE: PSYCHIC PATTERN IN THE LATER

POEMS.” Australasian Journal of American Studies, vol. 6, no. 2, 1987, pp. 9–

16. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41053453.

The Australia New Zealand American Studies Association (ANZASA) was

created for the study and research of all the aspects of U.S. culture and society. They

publish the Australasian Journal of American Studies, as well as holding conferences,

publishing papers and seminars on this research. The author of this source, Catherine A

Runcie, is known for writing multiple scholarly articles, as well as a few books. This

source focuses on three of Poe’s works, ‘The Bells’, ‘The Raven’, and ‘Ulalume’, all of

which could be classified as “emotional works”. Runcie says that “women, love, death,

grief and their interrelation...”(Runcie pg 9) influence these works and that these themes

are easily found in others as well. She says that these exaggerated and desperate emotions

can not be found to be ‘real’ or ‘actual’ things that have happened, because Poe doesn’t

give much detail with his imagery. She also says that Poe uses imagery as the equivalent

of something that can be found on the inside. He uses real places, like words or the sea to

exemplify a “landscape of the mind”. (Runcie pg 9) She also states that Poe’s imagery

“connotes ontological differences is differing states of consciousness.” (Runcie pg 10)

which is where you can find Poe’s personality in his works. Using psychoanalysis, this

source is helpful is research of the thesis of this annotation. If the reader is looking for a

glimpse of Poe in his work, it can be seen through the imagery as well as the way the

works focus on things like love, and death and how those effect the plot of the work.
Hubbell, Jay B. “POE AND THE SOUTHERN LITERARY TRADITION.” Texas

Studies in Literature and Language, vol. 2, no. 2, 1960, pp. 151–171. JSTOR,

JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40753669.

University of Texas Press, who was founded in 1950, published this source. They

publish over 90 books and 11 journals a year. They focus on general interest as well as

history and culture. The author, Jay Hubble has published many articles with them, and is

known for his critical theory writing. In this text, he uses a source from Allen Tate to see

if there is a “Southern Literary Tradition” and to see if Poe followed this notion. The

source says that while Poe was a southern, he was not much of an example of it. They

compare him to William Gilmore Simms in saying that Simms was known for his ‘ante-

bellum’ southern literature. Hubble says that Poe was more influenced by the northern

traditions than southern. Hubble also takes a look at Poe’s political stance and how he

showed his beliefs in his life and in his writing. When connecting this with these, it does

aid in looking at how Poe’s environment changed him and his writings. Although he is a

Southern by birth, he is not letting that influence him as much as where he finds himself

as an adult.

Marks, Emerson R. “Poe as Literary Theorist: A Reappraisal.”American Literature, vol.

33, no. 3, 1961, pp. 296–306. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2922125.

Duke University Press publishes more than 100 books and thirty journals yearly,

focusing in the humanities and social sciences. Over the years the press has developed

and become more diverse, adding more journals in the genres of math and law. With

these new areas of writing, it has gained a reputation in the theory of history and cultural

production. The author, Emerson R. Marks, has written many books and scholarly
sources in his career. This source talks seeks to question Poe as a literally critic. In this

source Marks seems to discredit Poe, as he talks about how his works represents his

values, and his blindness of values of complexity as a whole. Marks’ says that how Poe

represents himself in his work and through his criticism makes it his ‘seldom best’ work.

This source did not prove helpful to this particular annotation because this source makes

Poe’s environment and expression into something that can be used to discredit him.