The New York herald., 1922-08-13

Poe-with the exception of
1.-The critical papers-has just ap-
peared in Germany. Although the
French, under initiative of the
gloomy and satanic Baudelaire, were
the first to obtain European recogni-
ton for Poe. the Germans have been
among his most persistent exploiters
and admirers. Poe, a genius, so un-
American that he has always been
regarded as "out of time, out of
place" in our native literature. as a
Kind OF exotic plant, sport in the
garden Of the Yankee muse, has
found spiritual home in both of
these continental countries. In
France the Latin traits in his genius
are recognized and honored, the deli
caey of his imagination, the sensa-
uonal. the bizarre, the subtle, the
amoral abandonment to art pour
Fart, the diablerie and extravaganza
OF his fancy, as well as his passion
ate alteration Of beauty. The Ger
man soul felt a powerful kinslip
with the fathomless melancholy that
pervades his work, the rarifed Welt
schmerz, the Tooding preoccupation
with the problem OF death, his INTEL
lectual and esthetic exploitation OF
the emotions of terror and horror, his
mystic and metaphysical abstrac-
tions and analyses. In addition to
this. the Germans were captivated by
his new and revolutionary verse
forms, the music and the rhythms
that were a law unto themselves. his
yearnins for the universal, his chaI
lenge Of destiny in the Faustian
sense, his Gothic grotesquerie.
The French have continued 10
honor Poe chiefly as a lyric poet.
though his detective tales inspired a
school Of French writer's. The rev.
erence paid him in France is not
without strong by-taste of the sa-
tanic. the sadistic and the perverse-
Of the fascination exercised, for ex-
ample, by such stories as THE Pit
and the Pendulum" "The Cask of
Amontillado" and other forerunners
Of the school of Lie Grand GuignoI-
artistic cruelty. In Germany the ar
tistic pessimism of THE Raven" the |
romantic. feudal tragedy of The |
FAN Of the House of Usher" helped |
to impregnate whole generation of |
writer's. But in sense it was the |
continuation of tradition, for the |
Germans had had two forerunners Of |
Poe, or at least of phases and parts |
Of Poe, in the dynamic. demoniacal, |
Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffman,,
the weird. extravagant, passionate
genius whose hundredth death ami
yersary tJune %, 1929 all Germany
has just been celebrating.
Just as there are certain years in
Poe's life upon which the veil has
never been lifted. SO there are
sources OF his inspiration which have
hitherto remained obscure. Poe was
q creative spirit Of such pride and
power that even an acknowledgment
OF the slightest debt 10 another was
sbhorrent TO him. and bound up with
this pride there was a certain fine
feminine vanity which enabled him
intuitively 10 conceal the origins OF
his ideas. those flashes of suggestion
that came 10 him from other iiters-
lures and from other writers when
ne quoted from others these we're
usually obscure or unknown a. even
Imaginary writers. II i known that
he professed 20 be xsrsed in Ian
gnages q which he knew very little.
Why. then. should ID - impossible
that he was verscd In languages OF
which he pretended 70 be ignorant?
The threads that 20 10 make up
the fabric OF a poets creation are
manifold and long. and to pick them
out 81 the finished product j. almost
as impossible as to discern the riIls
OF rain and the grains Of earth that
vent to build up flower. Never
theiess that part OF the critical fac
ulty that works in the spirit rather
than by the letter. by appereeption
rather than by analogy, by intuition