Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, page 221
Mr. Hawthorne’s distinctive trait is invention, creation, imagination, originality — a trait which, in the literature of fiction, is positively worth all the rest. But the nature of originality, so far as regards its manifestation in letters, is but imperfectly understood. The inventive or original mind as frequently displays itself in novelty of tone as in novelty of matter. Mr. Hawthorne is original at all points.
It would be a matter of some difficulty to designate the best of these tales; we repeat that, without exception, they are beautiful. “Wakefield” is remarkable for the skill with which an old idea — a well-known incident — is worked up or discussed. A man of whims conceives the purpose of quitting his wife and residing incognito, for twenty years in her immediate neighborhood. Something of this kind actually happened in London. The force of Mr. Hawthorne’s tale lies in the analysis of the motives which must or might have impelled the husband to such folly, in the first instance, with the possible causes of his perseverance. Upon this thesis a sketch of singular power has been constructed. “The Wedding Knell” is full of the boldest imagintion — an imagination fully controlled by taste. The most captious critic could find no flaw in this production. “The Minister’s Black Veil” is a masterly composition of which the sole defect is that to the rabble its exquisite skill will be caviare. The obvious meaning of this article will be found to smother its insinuated one. The moral put into the mouth of the dying minister will be supposed to convey the true import of the narrative; and that a crime of dark dye, (having reference to the “young lady”) has been committed, is a point which only minds congenial with that of the author will perceive. “Mr. Higginbotham’s Catastrophe” is vividly original and managed most dexterously. “Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment” is exceedingly well imagined, and executed with surpassing ability. The artist breathes in every line of it. “The White Old Maid” is objectionable, even more than the “Minister’s Black Veil,” on the score of its mysticism. Even with the thoughtful and analytic, there will be much trouble in penetrating its entire import.
“The Hollow of the Three Hills” we would quote in full, had we space; — not as evincing higher talent than any of the other pieces, but as affording an excellent example of the author’s peculiar ability. The subject is commonplace. A witch subjects the Distant and the Past to the view of a mourner. It has been the fashion to describe, in such cases, a mirror in which the images of the absent appear; or a cloud of smoke is made to arise, and thence the figures are gradually unfolded. Mr. Hawthorne has wonderfully heightened his effect by making the ear, in place of the eye, the medium by which the fantasy is conveyed. The head of the mourner is enveloped in the cloak of the witch, and within its magic folds there arise sounds which have an all-sufficient intelligence. Throughout this article also, the artist is conspicuous — not more in positive than in negative merits. Not only is all done that should be done, but (what perhaps is an end with more difficulty attained) there is nothing done which should not be. Every word tells, and there is not a word which does not tell.
In “Howe’s Masquerade” we observe something which resembles a plagiarism — but which may be a very flattering coincidence of thought. We quote the passage in question.
With a dark flush of wrath upon his brow they saw the general draw his sword and advance to meet the figure in the cloak before the latter had stepped one pace upon the floor. “Villain, unmuffle yourself,” cried he, “you pass no farther!” The figure, without blenching a hair’s breadth from the sword which was pointed at his breast, made a solemn pause, and lowered the cape of the cloak from his face, yet not sufficiently for the spectators to catch a glimpse of it. But Sir William Howe had evidently seen enough. The sternness of his countenance gave place to a look of wild amazement, if not horror, while he recoiled several steps from the figure, and let fall his sword upon the floor. — See vol. 2, page 20.
The idea here is, that the figure in the cloak is the phantom or reduplication of Sir William Howe; but in an article called “William Wilson,” one of the “Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque,” we have not only the same idea, but the same idea similarly presented in several respects. We quote two paragraphs, which our readers may compare with what has been already given. We have italicized, above, the immediate particulars of resemblance.
The brief moment in which I averted my eyes had been sufficient to produce, apparently, a material change in the arrangement at the upper or farther end of the room. A large mirror, it appeared to me, now stood where none had been perceptible before: and as I stepped up to it in extremity of terror, mine own image, but with features all pale and dabbled in blood, advanced with a feeble and tottering gait to meet me. Thus it appeared I say, but was not. It was Wilson, who then stood before me in the agonies of dissolution. Not a line in all the marked and singular lineaments of that face which was not even identically mine own. His mask and cloak lay where he had thrown them, upon the floor. — Vol. 2. p. 57.
Here, it will be observed that, not only are the two general conceptions identical, but there are various points of similarity. In each case the figure seen is the wraith or duplication of the beholder. In each case the scene is a masquerade. In each case the figure is cloaked. In each, there is a quarrel — that is to say, angry words pass between the parties. In each the beholder is enraged. In each the cloak and sword fall upon the floor. The “villain, unmuffle yourself,” of Mr. H. is precisely paralleled by a passage at page 56, of “William Wilson.”
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I must hasten to conclude this paper with a summary of Mr. Hawthorne’s merits and demerits.
He is peculiar and not original — unless in those detailed fancies and detached thoughts which his want of general originality will deprive of the appreciation due to them, in preventing them for ever reaching the public eye. He is infinitely too fond of allegory, and can never hope for popularity so long as he persists in it. This he will not do, for allegory is at war with the whole tone of his nature, which disports itself never so well as when escaping from the mysticism of his Goodman Browns and White Old Maids into the hearty, genial, but still Indian-summer sunshine of his Wakefields and Little Annie’s Rambles. Indeed, his spirit of “metaphor run-mad” is clearly imbibed from the phalanx and phalanstery atmosphere in which he has been so long struggling for breath. He has not half the material for the exclusiveness of authorship that he possesses for its universality. He has the purest style, the finest taste, the most available scholarship, the most delicate humor, the most touching pathos, the most radiant imagination, the most consummate ingenuity; and with these varied good qualities he has done well as a mystic. But is there any one of these qualities which should prevent his doing doubly as well in a career of honest, upright, sensible, prehensible and comprehensible things? Let him mend his pen, get a bottle of visible ink, come out from the Old Manse, cut Mr. Alcott, hang (if possible) the editor of “The Dial,” and throw out of the window to the pigs all his odd numbers of “The North American Review.”
ELIZABETH FRIEZE ELLETT.
Mrs. ELLETT, or ELLET, has been long before the public as an author. Having contributed largely to the newspapers and other periodicals in her youth, she first made her debût on a more comprehensive scale, as the writer of “Teresa Contarini”, in a five-act tragedy, which had considerable merit, but was withdrawn after its first night of representation at the Park. This occurred at some period previous to the year 1834; the precise date I am unable to remember. The ill success of the play had little effect in repressing the ardor of the poetess, who has since furnished numerous papers to the Magazines. Her articles are, for the most part, in the rifacimento way, and, although no doubt composed in good faith, have the disadvantage of looking as if hashed up for just so much money as they will bring. The charge of wholesale plagiarism which has been adduced against Mrs. Ellett, I confess that I have not felt sufficient interest in her works, to investigate — and am therefore bound to believe it unfounded. In person, short and much included to embonpoint.
AMELIA WELBY.
MRS. AMELIA WELBY has nearly all the imagination of Maria del Occidente, with a more refined taste; and nearly all the passion of Mrs. Norton, with a nicer ear, and (what is surprising) equal art. Very few American poets are at all comparable with her in the true poetic qualities. As for our poetesses (an absurd but necessary word), few of them approach her.
With some modifications, this little poem would do honor to any one living or dead:
The moon within our casement beams,
Our blue-eyed babe hath dropped to sleep,
And I have left it to its dreams
Amid the shadows deep,
To muse beside the silver tide
Whose waves are rippling at thy side.
It is a still and lovely spot
Where they have laid thee down to rest;
The white-rose and forget-me-not
Bloom sweetly on thy breast,
And birds and streams with liquid lull
Have made the stillness beautiful.
And softly thro’ the forest bars
Light lovely shapes, on glossy plumes,
Float ever in, like winged stars,
Amid the purpling glooms:
Their sweet songs, borne from tree to tree,
Thrill the light leaves with melody.
Alas! the very path I trace,
In happier hours thy footsteps made;
This spot was once thy resting-place;
Within the silent shade
Thy white hand trained the fragrant bough
That drops its blossoms o’er me now.
‘Twas here at eve we used to rove;
‘Twas here I breathed my whispered vows,
And sealed them on thy lips, my love,
Beneath the apple-boughs.
Our hearts had melted into one,
But Death undid what Love had done.
Alas! too deep a weight of thought
Had fill’d thy heart in youth’s sweet hour;
It seem ‘d with love and bliss o’erfraught;
As fleeting passion-flower
Unfolding ‘neath a southern sky,
To blossom soon and soon to die.
Yet in these calm and blooming bowers,
I seem to see thee still,
Thy breath seems floating o’er the flowers,
Thy whisper on the hill;
The clear faint star-light and the sea
Are whispering to my heart of thee.
No more thy smiles my heart rejoice —
Yet still I start to meet thine eye,
And call upon the low sweet voice
That gives me no reply —
And list within my silent door
For the light feet that come no more.
In a critical mood I would speak of these stanzas thus: — The subject has nothing of originality: — A widower muses by the grave of his wife. Here then is a great demerit; for originality of theme, if not absolutely first sought, should be sought among the first. Nothing is more clear than this proposition — although denied by the chlorine critics (the grass-green). The desire of the new is an element of the soul. The most exquisite pleasures grow dull in repetition. A strain of music enchants. Heard a second time it pleases. Heard a tenth, it does not displease. We hear it a twentieth, and ask ourselves why we admired. At the fiftieth it induces ennui — at the hundredth, disgust.
Mrs. Welby’s theme is, therefore, radically faulty so far as originality is concerned; — but of common themes, it is one of the very best among the class passionate. True passion is prosaic — homely. Any strong mental emotion stimulates all the mental faculties; thus grief the imagination: — but in proportion as the effect is strengthened, the cause surceases. The excited fancy triumphs — the grief is subdued — chastened — is no longer grief. In this mood we are poetic, and it is clear that a poem now written will be poetic in the exact ratio of its dispassion. A passionate poem is a contradiction in terms. When I say, then, that Mrs. Welby’s stanzas are good among the class passionate (using the term commonly and falsely applied), I mean that her tone is properly subdued, and is not so much the tone of passion, as of a gentle and melancholy regret, interwoven with a pleasant sense of the natural loveliness surrounding the lost in the tomb, and a memory of her human beauty while alive. — Elegiac poems should either assume this character, or dwell purely on the beauty (moral or physical) of the departed — or, better still, utter the notes of triumph. I have endeavored to carry out this latter idea in some verses which I have called “Lenore.”
Those who object to the proposition — that poetry and passion are discordant — would cite Mrs. Welby’s poem as an instance of a passionate one. It is precisely similar to the hundred others which have been cited for like purpose. But it is not passionate; and for this reason (with others having regard to her fine genius) it is poetical. The critics upon this topic display an amusing ignoratio elenchi.
Dismissing originality and tone, I pass to the general handling, than which nothing could be more pure, more natural, or more judicious. The perfect keeping of the various points is admirable — and the result is entire unity of impression, or effect. The time, a moonlight night; the locality of the grave; the passing thither from the cottage, and the conclusion of the theme with the return to “the silent door;” the babe left, meanwhile, “to its dreams;” the “white rose and forget-me-not” upon the breast of the entombed; the “birds and streams, with liquid lull, that make the stillness beautiful;” the birds whose songs “thrill the light leaves with melody;” — all these are appropriate and lovely conceptions: — only quite unoriginal; — and (be it observed), the higher order of genius should, and will combine the original with that which is natural — not in the vulgar sense, (ordinary) — but in the artistic sense, which has reference to the general intention of Nature. — We have this combination well effected in the lines:
And softly through the forest bars
Light lovely shapes, on glossy plumes,
Float ever in, like winged stars,
Amid the purpling glooms —
which are, unquestionably, the finest in the poem.
The reflections suggested by the scene — commencing:
Alas! the very path I trace,
are, also, something more than merely natural, and are richly ideal; especially the cause assigned for the early death; and “the fragrant bough”
That drops its blossoms o’er me now.
The two concluding stanzas are remarkable examples of common fancies rejuvenated, and etherealized by grace of expression, and melody of rhythm.
The “light lovely shapes” in the third stanza (however beautiful in themselves), are defective, when viewed in reference to the “birds” of the stanza preceding. The topic “birds” is dismissed in the one paragraph, to be resumed in the other.
“Drops,” in the last line of the fourth stanza, is improperly used in an active sense. To drop is a neuter verb. An apple drops; we let the apple fall.
The repetition (“seemed,” “seem,” “seems,”) in the sixth and seventh stanzas, is ungraceful; so also that of “heart,” in the last line of the seventh, and the first of the eighth. The words “breathed” and “whispered,” in the second line of the fifth stanza, have a force too nearly identical. “Neath,”just below, is an awkward contraction. All contractions are awkward. It is no paradox, that the more prosaic the construction of verse, the better. Inversions should be dismissed. The most forcible lines are the most direct. Mrs. Welby owes three-fourths of her power (so far as style is concerned), to her freedom from these vulgar, and particularly English errors — elision and inversion. O’er is, however, too often used by her in place of over, and ‘twas for it was. We see instances here. The only inversions, strictly speaking, are
The moon within our casement beams,
and — “Amid the shadows deep.”
The versification throughout, is unusually good. Nothing can excel
And birds and streams with liquid lull
Have made the stillness beautiful . . . . .
And sealed them on thy lips, my love,
Beneath the apple-boughs . . . . .
or the whole of the concluding stanza, if we leave out of view the unpleasant repetition of “And,” at the commencement of the third and fifth lines. “Thy white hand trained “ (see stanza the fourth) involves four consonants, that unite with difficulty — ndtr — and the harshness is rendered more apparent, by the employment of the spondee, “hand trained,” in place of an iambus. “Melody,” is a feeble termination of the third stanza’s last line. The syllable dy is not full enough to sustain the rhyme. All these endings, liberty, property, happily, and the like, however justified by authority, are grossly objectionable. Upon the whole, there are some poets in America (Bryant and Sprague, for example), who equal Mrs. Welby in the negative merits of that limited versification which they chiefly affect — the iambic pentameter — but none equal her in the richer and positive merits of rhythmical variety, conception — invention. They, in the old routine, rarely err. She often surprises, and always delights, by novel, rich and accurate combination of the ancient musical expressions.
BAYARD TAYLOR.
I BLUSH to see, in the Literary World, an invidious notice of BAYARD TAYLOR’s “Rhymes of Travel.” What makes the matter worse, the critique is from the pen of one who, although undeservedly, holds, himself, some position as a poet: — and what makes the matter worst, the attack is anonymous, and (while ostensibly commending) most zealously endeavors to damn the young writer “with faint praise.” In his whole life, the author of the criticism never published a poem, long or short, which could compare, either in the higher merits, or in the minor morals of the Muse, with the worst of Mr. Taylor’s compositions.
