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 ...
Poe's life
Edgar’s Scottish Roots
Not only does the Edgar Poe’s family history contain an abundance of interesting details and accounts, but also does his foster father’s family, the Allan family. A family history enriched with a Scottish background, John Allan and family influenced young Edgar, as well as the Poe Museum, in many ways. In the following post, we will follow accounts of Edgar Poe and his foster family in Europe, visiting with Allan’s Scottish family members, learn about an uncovered Allan family gravestone in Scotland found in the late 1990s, and learn about the family’s descendants’ correspondences with the Poe ...
Edgar’s Bitterest Enemy
Edgar Allan Poe had many enemies during his life--there is no questioning this—but only one man held the significant title of being Poe’s “bitterest enemy.” Was it Rufus Griswold, Poe’s literary executor, you may ask? No. Maybe, John Allan, Edgar’s foster father who butted heads with the poet until Allan’s death? Not quite. Who, you may inquire, was named Edgar Poe’s bitterest enemy? His own cousin, Neilson Poe.
Born with his twin sister, Amelia, to Jacob and Bridget Poe, in Baltimore on August 11, 1809, Neilson (pronounced “Nelson”) was grandson of George Poe Sr.(Frank 278, 281; Silverman ...
One Woman’s Determination Brought the Poe Museum Its July Object of the Month
Every object in the Poe Museum tells a story. Each artifact or piece of ephemera helps us interpret the story of Edgar Allan Poe’s life and influence. The July Object of the Month is no exception. The Cornwell Daguerreotype is a distinctly arresting image of Poe taken at a low point in the author’s life, four days after a suicide attempt. His fiancée Sarah Helen Whitman, who owned the original, which she named the "Ultima Thule" Daguerreotype, pronounced it "wonderful" and told Poe's biographer John H. Ingram that it had been taken "after a wild distracted night . . . and all the stormy ...