Many may be familiar with the recent Drunk History episode featuring Edgar Allan Poe and a “Mr. Griswold.” But how many actually know who Griswold is? Yes, Drunk History, the popular Comedy Central show, portrayed him, but was he accurately portrayed?
It is true that many of the popular misconceptions about Poe derive directly from Griswold, the “defamer” of the poet. This editor and enemy of Poe was the source of many fallacies about Edgar’s alcohol and drug addictions, among other things. But why did Griswold go to such great lengths to destroy Edgar’s reputation? Who was this man and what ...
death
New Exhibit Explores Death and Mourning in Poe’s Age
Think Poe was morbid because he wrote so often about death in poems like "Annabel Lee," "The Raven," and "Lenore?" Such poems about death and mourning were actually fairly common in the nineteenth century. With high infant mortality rates and the inability to combat diseases like tuberculosis (which claimed Poe’s mother, foster mother, brother, and wife), death was very much a part of everyday life. One in four children in Poe’s time died in infancy, and many women died in childbirth. Consequently, almost everyone knew someone who had died young. In this light, Poe's poems about the deaths of ...