The Women of Poe's Poems and Tales

University of Texas Press
THE WOMEN OF POE'S POEMS AND TALES

Author(s): Floyd Stovall
Source: Studies in English, No. 5 (October 8, 1925), pp. 197-209
Published by: University of Texas Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20779365
Accessed: 29-10-2015 16:00 UTC
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/
info/about/policies/terms.jsp
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content
in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.
For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
University of Texas Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Studies in English.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 142.58.129.109 on Thu, 29 Oct 2015 16:00:39 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
THE WOMEN OF POE'S POEMS AND TALES
By Floyd Stovall
No other great American poet has been so consistent as

Edgar Allan Poe in his use of women as the subject of poetry.
Of the fifty-two poems unquestionably accredited to him,
twenty-five, including all of his best productions except
three or four, have to do with women. Other poets have
created a larger number of women characters and have
written more
and longer poems about them, but they have
written in a more impersonal way. For them women have
been merely an occasional subject, one among numerous
others equally important; while for Poe they were a con
tinual inspiration, and they always reflect in varying
degrees his own personality. In most of his prose, which
is more objective, women play no part, or else they appear
as mere mechanisms of the plot, without character or indi
viduality. In certain of his stories, however, that are
more poetic in theme and style, Poe is as much preoccupied
with women as in his poetry.
Most of Poe's women, too, are very much alike in ap
pearance and in character. He is particularly fond of the
woman with' a "classic face" and "hyacinth hair," who ap
pears in the first "To Helen" and in the two stories, "The
Assignation" and "Ligeia." With these classic features are
associated usually a queenly stature, a pallid brow, bright
eyes, and a musical voice. The hair usually is very dark
or very fair and almost always curly. Poe's women are
either extremely innocent and unsophisticated, like
Eleonora and Annabel Lee, or else abnormally intellectual,
like Ligeia and Morella. They are all noble and good, and
naturally very beautiful, though sometimes made ugly by
disease, as in the case of Berenice. Most remarkable of all
is their passionate and enduring love for his hero.
In name as well as in character and appearance, Poe's
women are akin. His names are usually unfamiliar and
198 Texas Studies in English
always beautiful, especially because of their musical quality.

This quality he secured chiefly by the use of long vowels,
liquids, and nasals. The device is obvious in such names
as Morella, Ligeia, and Eleonora, yet those characters ap
pear natural enough. But Ulalume, created by the same
process, is likely to seem fantastic and unreal to the average
reader. Lenore was selected for the poem "Lenore" because
of its musical quality and its sonorous, mournful sound.
In "The Raven" there was the additional and determining
reason that Lenore rhymed perfectly with nevermore. It
is more than likely that Berenice, Madeline, and Aphrodite
were selected for their historical or poetic associations as
well as for their musical sound. Annabel Lee was chosen
for its simplicity; and the spiritual nature of Nesace and
Ianthe determined their names. In practically every case,
the name is appropriate to the character, and even adds
materially to the effect which Poe was desirous of producing
upon the reader's mind. This effect was usually that of
sadness. But when he desired a happier theme, he was
able to find a suitable name, as in the poem "Eulalie."
Before entering upon a detailed discussion of the poems
and tales which have to do with women, itwill be convenient
to reduce them to classified groups.
They fall, it seems to
me, into five general classes. First there are a number of
pieces that describe spiritual beings in feminine form.
Then there are both poems and tales that have to do with
the death of women, Poe's favorite theme. A third group
introduce ideal and preternatural women; and a fourth
group should be made to include all other types of fictional
women. Finally, there are the living women of Poe's ac
quaintance. Necessarily there will be some overlapping
of these divisions, but they are definite enough for the
present purposes.
Of the spiritual beings in feminine form that grew out
of Poe's poetic imagination, Nesace, the queen of Al Aaraaf,
is probably the most important. Since Nesace is the per
fection of loveliness, it is significant that she has "golden
hair" and that she blushes. Her handmaiden, the
Ligeia,
The Women of Poe's Poems and Tales 199
spirit of music, is merely the personification of that beauty

which Poe often bestows upon the voice and the motions of
his heroines. Ianthe, the spirit-maiden whose love for
Angelo is the cause
of her fall from Al Aaraaf, is but
vaguely described.It is interesting to note that, even in the
spirit world, the feminine character, though beautiful and
faithful in love, is unable to absorb her lover's attention
completely; he still looks wistfullyback to earth, his former
dwelling place. A more familiar type of angel is described
in "The Conqueror Worm." Here there is a throng of
winged and veiled angels, pallid and wan, who weep as they
watch the tragedy of human life and death. The adjectives
pallid and wan are much used by Poe in the description of
his fictional women, which indicates that the angels of this
poem to whom they are applied should be conceived as
feminine in appearance.
The region or atmosphere surrounding these spiritual
beings further distinguishes them from Poe's other char
acters. Nesace dwells in a world that has nothing in
common with earth except melody and joy, a region of light
and flowers and music. She is in sight of Heaven, whence
she receivesmessages from God which it is her duty to
bear to all parts of the universe. There angels sleep or
stroll through fields of exquisite flowers, subject to the call
of Nesace. No ugliness or sin can abide there; for those
who are capable of doing wrong are enabled to resist the
temptation, or, failing that, are banished. In "The Con
queror Worm," the angels sit in a theatre, which is, I take
it, the universe, earth being the stage; the "vast formless
things" that shift the scenery are, then, war, famine, and
pestilence, and such natural forces as storms and earth
quakes, which may be said to control or at least strongly to
affect the fate of mankind. Here, however, there is no
attempt to describe a spirit world or to introduce spiritual
beings except superficially,thewhole intentbeing didactic,
or philosophical, and therefore abstract.
Believing the death of a beautiful woman to be themost
poetic of all themes, Poe wrote a number of poems on that
200 Texas Studies in English
subject. His theory has been partly substantiated by the

excellence of these productions, most of which are among
the best things that he did. There is in them, however,
much repetition of ideas and images and even of phrases,
and in spite of the poet's excellent art the theme grows
monotonous.
In appearance the women described in these mortuary

poems are much alike, especially in their vagueness, nor
do they differ materially from the women of Poe's stories.
In "The Sleeper" Irene lies dead in her room, and the poet
is particularly struck by her pallor, her strange dress, and
her long hair. The long hair is noteworthy, because length
of hair is rarely mentioned in Poe's feminine portraits. In
"Lenore" the dead woman is queenly, young, fair, and
yellow-haired. The Lenore of "The Raven" is not other
wise described than as a "rare and
radiant maiden," but
the grief of the surviving lover suggests a person of the
usual exotic beauty. The woman in "To One in Paradise"
is not named, and the only hint as to her appearance is that
she had grey1 eyes. Metaphorically she is described as being
to the poet a green isle in the sea, a fountain, and a shrine
all wreathed with flowers. No one is described or named
in "Spirits of the Dead," but the reader will feel the sex
of the person addressed to be feminine. The tone of the
poem suggests a person simpler and more real than Irene,
yet without the beautiful character of Annabel Lee. In
like manner, the appearance of Ulalume is implied rather
than stated directly. The language and strange emotions of
the poem indicate that Ulalume was more remote from real
ity even than Irene, and that she was as faultless as Annabel
Lee, though less beloved. In almost every case in this group
of poems, the body is but slightlydescribed,while the spirit
is felt as a thing detached, an atmosphere almost tangible
brooding over the bier.
The characterization is little, if any, more specific than
the description. The person addressed in "Spirits of the
*Text of 1845. All other texts have "dark."
Dead" was, by at
least, proud, haughty,
implication and
selfishly happy in life.
in "The Sleeper,"
Irene, is called
a "child of sin," but there is no special significance in the
phrase. She was human, and therefore a child of sin. Yet
the bitter tone of the poem hints mysteriously of an evil
which we can only vaguely surmise. Lenore in the poem
of that name is more sympathetically treated and more
closely related to real life; but she, too, is characterized in
general terms as saintly, sweet, and innocent, though proud.
Of the other Lenore we know still less, but we may safely
infer that she was beautiful and good, a "sainted maiden."
"To One in Paradise" suggests gaiety in the lady whom it
memorializes; and to be, as the poem says she was, all for
which the poet's soul pined, she must have been wise as
well as beautiful and good. I should remark, in this con
nection, that two of these poems, "To One in Paradise" and
"Spirits of the Dead," have to do only indirectly with death.
In the former the woman whose death is referred to had
previously gone away into a remote land, and in the latter
the death of the person addressed is prospective rather than
actual.
The abode of the dead, as pictured in these poems, is

not a pleasant place; and Poe is ordinarily careful not to
give or attempt to give a very detailed description of it.
Only in "Spirits of the Dead" do we find anything like a
definite picture. Here he imagines a person who has been
proud and care-free and somewhat selfish brought into
humble subjection to others?the spirits of those whom
she had scorned, perhaps, while they were all on earth.
It is a land of stillness and shadows and solitude and weary
night,where the spirit shall be a prey to dark thoughts and
disturbing visions. The region of "The City in the Sea"
is equally gloomy, still, and lonely; but it is a place whence
all living things have departed, the abode of Death rather
than of spirits. In "The Sleeper" Irene's body is still
reposing on the bier in her room, the author-lover appar
ently standing outside by her window, throughwhich he
can see the corpse and watch the moving shadows on the
202 Texas Studies inEnglish
floor and walis as the curtains of the canopy are blown by

gusts of wind. The proposed tomb of Irene is also de
scribed, and it is not less gloomy than the death-room or
the regions of the dead described in other poems. The
situation in "Lenore" is similar, but in this poem the lover
seems assured that the spirit of his mistress is in Heaven.
We are not told where the spirit of Ulalume abides, but her
tomb rests beside a dim, dank lake in a dark, misty forest,
probably a swamp, surrounded by all the ghostly circum
stances of a shadowy, unfrequented wood. We see, then,
that whether he was concerned with the death chamber,
the tomb, or the realm of spirits, Poe almost always saw a
place of gloom and solitude.
Let us turn now to the group of poems and tales of
women whose qualities are ideal or preternatural or both.
In this group is to be found the Ligeia of the prose tale?
not to be confused with that fairy creature, the spirit of
music and handmaiden of Nesace, queen of Al Aaraaf?who
is Poe's ideal woman. She is tall, slender, and majestic,
with a light and elastic footstep, a "marble hand," a lofty
and pale forehead, curly black hair, and a face that is classic
but not stiffly regular. But the most fascinating thing
about her is her eyes, overhung by long, jetty
large gazelle
lashes and slightly irregular brows.
black, There is, per
haps, a suggestion of the Ligeia of the poem in the ethereal
beauty of her face, which seems to him "the radiance of an
opium-dream?an airy and spirit-lifting vision more wildly
divine than the phantasies which hovered about the slumber
ing souls of the daughters of Delos." He finds, too, in the
"immense" learning of Ligeia a true complement to her
great beauty. Her power of will is so great that she is
able to transfer her own spirit into the corpse of the Lady
Rowena, the hero's second bride. Thus she appeals to Poe's
scientific mind as well as to his aesthetic sense. To these
attributes,beauty and intellectuality, he needs only to add
supreme love in order to make his heroine the incarnation
of feminine perfection.
Of the other women of this group, Morella and Berenice

resemble Ligeia but are much inferior and not so minutely
described. Morella is said to have wan fingers, a musical
voice, and melancholy eyes. Nowhere else, so far as I
know, does Poe give melancholy eyes to one of his heroines.
Berenice, before being attacked by a terrible disease, is
agile, graceful, and energetic. In Annabel Lee and
Eleonora, both of whom are idealized portraits of Poe's
child-wife, Virginia, we see a type of woman differing some
what from the three described above. We learn from the
poem that Annabel Lee is a child, that she has bright eyes,
and that she is beautiful. Eleonora, in the prose version of
the same day-dream of love, is much the same. She has
bright eyes, smooth cheeks, and a sweet voice, and she is a
child of fourteen or fifteen years. The girl-wife of the
painter described in "The Oval Portrait" is a maiden of
"immortal beauty" with "radiant" hair, as her portrait
indicates.
The same sort of contrast is made in the characterization.
In the poem "Annabel Lee" as well as in the story "Eleo
nora," Poe conceived of a maiden blameless and tender and
pure, but without the mental superiority of Ligeia. Annabel
Lee is a child of love and happiness, ignorant alike of sin
and sorrow, and so high-souled that she may claim close
kinship with the angels. Eleonora, however, is slightly
jealous, a venial fault which sets her apart from and
somewhat below the saintly maiden of the poem. With
these two must be mentioned the bride in "The Oval Por
trait," a lovely creature, "all light and smiles and frolic
some as a young fawn," who sits patiently in her husband's
gloomy studio and smiles uncomplainingly, and slowly
wastes away to death rather than hinder him in the painting
of his masterpiece. Of the others in this group, Morella,
though she resembles Ligeia as I have said, is imbuedwith
more of mysticism and magic, and there is something about
her that savors of evil. The hero-author himself dislikes
her and wishes her dead. In order to win his love she,
after having died in child-birth, is reincarnated in the
person of her daughter. Berenice, who is well and light

hearted at first, but later emaciated and epileptic, is first
buried alive and later horribly mutilated by her ghoulish
husband. Berenice is not so finely drawn as the other
characters of this type, and the author's interest in her is
purely impersonal and scientific. All the women of this
group are far removed from reality and possess qualities,
whether of the heart or of the intellect, which are preter
natural if not superhuman; yet they are, on their purely
aesthetic side, the finest of Poe's creations.
Of Poe's other fictional women there are four classes:
those of the minor poems, are not
those of the stories who
clearly individualized, the grotesque women, and the women
who are mere mechanisms of the plot. In the first class,
only one or two of the most salient features of any one
individual are mentioned, but these same features appear
in many different
persons and unrelated poems. Ada, in
"Tamerlane," is remembered for "the blush on her bright
cheek"; and the same sort of blush appears in "Song" (I
saw thee on thy bridal day) and in "Eulalie." The eyes are
the features most often noted by Poe, and they are usually
bright, as is the case in the "Song" above mentioned, in
'To-" (The bowers whereat, etc.), and in "Eulalie."
The same feature, it will be remembered, was noted in each
of the ideal or preternatural women except Morella, and
will be found, likewise, in the less important Marchesa
Aphrodite in "The Assignation." In the poem "To the
River," Alberto's daughter is described as having soul
searching eyes. In general, it may be said that Poe found
beauty in woman chiefly in her eyes, and after that, in her
hair and in her brow. Among the women of the second
class of this general group may be mentioned the Marchesa
Aphrodite, referred to above, the "Kate" of "Three Sundays
in a Week," Madeline Usher, Madame Lalande of "The
Spectacles," and the women of "The Oblong Box." Of these
Madeline Usher is only a wraith, and Kate is without de
scription. In "The Spectacles" and in "The Oblong Box,"
Poe has attempted to create normal, everyday women, but
has succeeded only inmaking them ordinary and dull. The

grotestque creatures of such stories as "Hop-Frog" and
"King Pest" would be of little credit to any writer, and
they are mentioned here merely to show how Poe's imagi
nation shifted one extreme
from to another, from sheer
beauty to the most horrible ugliness. Finally, only I need
mention the various women stories, who
of the detective
are usually not described, and who exist for no other pur
pose than to satisfy the exigencies of the plot.
The characterization of the various women of this group,
where there is any characterization, is scant and extremely
generalized. As a rule the women of this group are more
realistic than the women of the remaining groups because
they are more objective and more probable. Ada, in
"Tamerlane," is virtuous and good and faithful, while
Eulalie is distinguished by her happiness and the joywhich
she brings to her husband, without even a suggestion of
sorrow or evil. In "Bridal Ballad" the heroine, though
somewhat fickle, is not without good traits. She suffers
chiefly by comparison with such characters as Annabel Lee
and Ligeia. Madame Lalande in "The
Spectacles" and the
spurious Mrs. Wyatt in "The Oblong Box" are quite human,
even if they are somewhat ludicrous; but the other women
of the stories are nonentities.
A number of Poe's poems were addressed to living women
of his acquaintance, and it is significant that he attributed
to these real persons many of the same features and charac
teristics with which he endowed the creatures of his imagi
nation. Just as in "Ligeia" he describes the eyes of his
ideal as "luminous orbs" and as "twin stars of Leda," so in
"A Valentine" avows he eloquently that Mrs. Osgood's
"luminous" eyes are as expressive as the "twins of Loeda."
In the second "To Helen," addressed to Mrs. Whitman, and
in "To M. L. S-," which was meant for Mrs. Shew,
Poe also makes much of the eyes, particularly of their
brightness. In "To Helen" his praises are so extravagant
as seriously to mar the beauty of the poem. These and
other correspondences indicate that he was always strongly

influenced in his descriptions by his one feminine ideal,
whose full portrait is to be seen in "Ligeia."
Little if anything can be ascertained of the true character
of the women to whom
these and other complimentary poems
were addressed. They may have been as beautiful and as
good as his poems declare them to be; but, as a reading
of his letters will show, he was often indiscriminate in his
praise and blame. The little poem "To My Mother" is
the simplest of the group, and I do not doubt that it is a
sincere expression of his love for Mrs. Clemm. In "To M. L.
S-" he declares that he owes hope, life, and faith to Mrs.
Shew, who faithfully watched over his wife in her last sick
ness and afterwards nursed him back to health. In "For
Annie" he expresses his gratitude to Mrs. Annie Richmond
for her many kindnesses and constant affection. Sentimen
tal and and impulsive as he was, itwas easy for him to write
such poems as these; yet, though they are couched in extrav
agant language, the emotions thus indelicately laid bare
must have been genuine and acute at the moment of writing.
Poe's whole attitude toward women, whether they were
persons of his acquaintance or mere figments of the imagi
nation, was unusual. Generally cold to the ruder advances
of men, he purred like a cat under the praise and sympathy
of his feminine friends. To his young wife, Virginia, he
was always attentive. He undoubtedly loved her, though
his love was an inconstant flame. He wrote to her only
one short letter that is preserved,2 but it reveals a sane and
enduring love, however inadequate, that makes his passion
ate letters to Mrs. Whitman seem tawdry. The first "To
Helen," written in 1831 to the memory of Mrs. Stanard,
was sent to Mrs. Whitman in 1848 as an expression of his
regard for her. Two other poems written in 1835 commem
orating certain relationships with other women were in
1845 reprinted under the titles "To-" and "To F-s
2Harrison, James A., The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poer
XVII, p. 232.
S. 0--d" as compliments to Mrs. Osgood. This passing

on of second-hand favors shows more economy than delicacy
in the poet. As a matter of fact, Poe often addressed verses
to his women friends to win their admiration rather than
to reveal the true state of his heart. He liked to send them
gorgeous bouquets of roses, though the roses were artificial.
His fictional women fared little better. He peered into
their souls with fantastic he probed their
colored
glasses;
minds with bright instruments that tinkled in his nervous
fingers. And such strange hearts and souls they were: not
of this world surely nor of paradise, but creatures of airy
fancy/of scientific curiosity, of morbid introspection, of half
remorseful brooding upon death. In all his stories he is
the hero, and usually the heroine is either his wife or his
betrothed. In several stories she is a cousin of his hero,
and in such cases she is invariably very young?about the
age of Virginia when she and Poe were married. For these
women Virginia was undoubtedly in such
the model.
Even
stories as "Berenice" and "Three Sundays in a Week,"
where there is no resemblance between Virginia and the
heroine, the relation of wife, or betrothed, and cousin per
sists. In every story the woman loves passionately and
unselfishly, whereas the man in most instances is coldly
unresponsive. This, I think, was the result of an analogous
situation which really existed, or which Poe sometimes
fancied to exist, in his relationship to Virginia. Sometimes
the women have unnatural occult powers, or become dis
eased or insane; they are never normal except in a very few
of the poorer tales.
Every one of Poe's women can be explained, I believe, by
reference to his own mind and character and to the circum
stances of his home life. Annabel Lee and Eleonora, as I
have already suggested, were idealized portraits of his wife,
Virginia; and other characters, such as Kate in "Three
Sundays in a Week," the young bride in "The Oval Portrait,"
and Berenice, either in personality or in their relation to the
hero-author, were probably suggested by her. Poe was
naturally inclined to brood upon death, but the long-illness
of his wife strengthened this tendency. A vision of

Virginia in death must have passed often and lingeringly
through his imagination, and I think it probable that such
visions are largely responsible for the frequency of death
scenes in his poems and tales. "Lenore" is clearly a dra
matic presentation of one of these visions, where the theme
is exaltation and scorn of death. In "The Raven" the antici
pation of the heroine's death is even stronger, and there
the theme is poignant grief mingled with remorse. In
"Ulalume," written after Virginia's death, grief is less
apparent, but remorse lingers and conflicts with the new
love that is dawning. Whether this remorse was due to
real or imagined causes is of little consequence here.
"Eulalie" well expresses the happier side of Poe's love, as
though itwere composed in a moment of unusual prosperity
and hope.
In the poems and tales that I have just enumerated the
characters and situations apparently grew out of the rela
tionship between Poe and his wife. In all other important
cases, Poe looked within for inspiration. He liked to endow
his women with faculties of mind and heart which he
possessed or longed to possess. Ligeia, as I have said, was
his ideal woman. Yet she was no more than a feminine
portrait of himself as he wished to be. Her personal
beauty, analytic mind, immense learning, powerful will, and
supreme love were qualities which he himself possessed in
varying degrees. Ligeia surpassed in will-power him most
and in love. His was a passionate love, but itwas generally
directed towards an ideal which had its nearest material
counterpart in himself; that is why his love for others was
so ardent at times, and yet so inadequate. Even among the
living women of his acquaintance he loved those most pas
sionately who he fancied were most like himself. To Mrs.
Whitman, for example, he was first drawn by the "thoughts,
sentiments, traits, moods" which he had believed were
peculiar to himself.3 In short, Poe was absorbed in him
3See letter to Mrs. Whitman, Poe's Works, XVII, pp. 232-3.
self, in analyzing his mind and soul and in worshiping

them with incense and exotic offerings. If, like Byron, he
did not "drag his bleeding heart across Europe/' he cer
tainly stained the pages of his books with itsmoods and
passions, where, together with the tricks and vagaries of his
incisive and curious mind, they form a strange and fasci
nating picture.

The Women of Poe's Poems and Tales - Stivall

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

The Women of Poe's Poems and Tales - Stivall

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

The Women of Poe's Poems and Tales - Stivall

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

University of Texas Press

No other great American poet has been so consistent as

always beautiful, especially because of their musical quality.

spirit of music, is merely the personification of that beauty

subject. His theory has been partly substantiated by the

In appearance the women described in these mortuary

*Text of 1845. All other texts have "dark."

The abode of the dead, as pictured in these poems, is

floor and walis as the curtains of the canopy are blown by

Of the other women of this group, Morella and Berenice

person of her daughter. Berenice, who is well and light

has succeeded only inmaking them ordinary and dull. The

other correspondences indicate that he was always strongly

2Harrison, James A., The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poer

S. 0--d" as compliments to Mrs. Osgood. This passing

of his wife strengthened this tendency. A vision of

3See letter to Mrs. Whitman, Poe's Works, XVII, pp. 232-3.

self, in analyzing his mind and soul and in worshiping

You might also like