Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe

"Hoffman is a very talented poet and critic who brings the right spirit to his project by making his own relationship with Poe’s writing a part of his study. He’s full of sharp insights, but his voice is engaging and human. The poet James Russell Lowell has a great line about Poe: “Three-fifths of him genius and two-fifths sheer fudge.” Poe is an erratic writer: some of his writing is juvenile, or just plain whacked. That’s partly because Poe was often writing under economic pressure but, also, as Hoffman shows, because Poe was such an experimentalist. He was always exploring new ways to influence his readers. Hoffman gets at the fact that Poe creates incredibly absorptive stories and poems. If you like them, you disappear into them, they become their own world. Poe stories aren’t aimed at illuminating the real world in a literal way, they create an alternative experience. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe is a lot of fun to read. It’s playful and experimental, providing an account of the ways that Poe shaped Hoffman’s sense of his own possibilities as a writer. Poe’s poetry is extremely musical. It’s full of complicated rhymes and intricate sound patterns. Since about 1900, American poetry has moved toward a more vernacular free verse that usually does away with rhyme. Poe explores the pleasure of repetition and pattern in extravagant ways. His poems are intricate ornaments for your ears, as well as for your mind. “He had to craft a living out of nothing but his wits and industry” Poe’s most famous poem is “The Raven,” which became such an enormous hit that he toured the US reading it at theaters. “The Raven” is about this bird that appears one stormy night in the room of a man who just lost his love. The raven comes in and says one word: “nevermore.” The narrator poses a series of questions for the raven, “Will I see my love again?” and “Will there be any hope for me in heaven?” Each question gets more dire, and the answer is always “nevermore.” That kind of self-vexing pleasure is at the core of many Poe poems and romantic tales. We turn to Poe’s poems about loss not just for comfort but to wiggle the tooth that aches us."