The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1913-02-25
PROF. JOHNS DEFENDS POE.
Remarkable and Very interesting
Interpretation of the Rsyer


Saturday afternoon, at its co8ins
session, lie Carter County Teachers
association listened to splendid,
forceful defense of Poe, followed BY
the best interpretive reading of THE
Raven ever heard in our city.
Prof Carl NJ. Johns, of Hats!ove
college, was the speaker, and his
defense of the American genus was
short, crisp, and masterful. During
his present years work in Ardmore,
frof. Johns Las established record
for sincere, earnest work. and his
baldling of Poe's masterpiece show
ed the results of years of hard, per-
sistent labor and study. Every shade
Of expression and tone color showed
clear, concise attack, and the in
terpreter showed, behind his wonder
full command of the technique of eX-
preston a sincere and perfect obe-
dience to the spirit of the poem it.
self.
In, his defense of the author, the
81 eaker was not sparing in his criti-
cism of teachers who, ignorantly and
otherwise, permit Poe's true genius
20 be obscured by reading maudlin
sentiment into his lines. The speak
er said in part:
Let me state my position with
reference to the matter in hand ]
believe The Raven" to be meter,
rhythm, unity, and psychical tone con-
siGered, mountains high over
hest similar effort of any poet since
the author of Beowulf first charmed
the minds of the savage Angles and
SaXons. This is indeed a radical
statement, but it has this much to
commend it: 1t was not arrived at by
the results of week or two weeks
study but is the conclusion reached
after four years of thought and a
constant use of the selection before
lyCeum audiences in eight states and
in classroom study.
Il have but little patience with
the didactic and pedantic efforts of
Would-be daubers in literature to read
into 'TheRaven' supposed personal
thoughts and hope for eternity of the
author. 1t is inexcusable, as even the
most desultory study of but two of
the authors essays ('The Poetic
Principle, and The Philosopher of
C1mposition,D unearths the impos-
sibility of such hypothesis. To my
mind it is the act of the criminal al
bet perhaps done unknowingly, to
snatch the silent figure from his
niche in the Hall of Fame, and force
it to wallow in the muck of senti-
ment for his own selfish pleasure.
at is a pitable outrage that these
fallacies, survive; the more pitiable
that it is ineXcusable. The more in
eycusable that it has been propagat.
2d by members OF the clergy and our
own chosen profession. How much
worse than the darkness of the Sea
Cf Ignorance is the Fata Morgana of !
hypocritioal enlightenment which has
sullied the fame of the brainiest, II
perhaps the most erratic, writer in
the realm of American literature!
No; there is not even the wrath |
Of reason for reading into The Raven
a hope for eternity or the hidden
thoughts of the author. Suffice it to |
note that we have Poe's own words
for two important things which
should, long ago, have silenced those
who harp so persistently on their
string of fancy. First, that the first
5tanza written or even sketched was
hat containing the climax, i. e. the
third from the last. Second, that
he raven itself never did mean and
never can mean anything other than
the Spirit of NeNer-dying Remem-
,rsnce."