The Poetic Principle
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists, catalogue entry only
- Written
- lecture 1848, published 1850
- Form
- Essay
- Language
- English
- Length
- Short · 25 ppunder 120 pages
- Difficulty
- Moderate2 of 5 for a first-year reader
We recommendEssays and ReviewsLibrary of America, 1984The companion volume to Poetry and Tales, with The Philosophy of Composition and the reviews beside it.
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A lecture Poe delivered several times in the last year of his life and published after his death. He argues that a long poem is a contradiction in terms, since poetic excitement cannot be sustained, and denounces the heresy of the didactic, the belief that poetry should teach a moral. Poetry is instead the rhythmical creation of beauty, and its province is taste, between the pure intellect and the moral sense. He illustrates the argument with poems by Longfellow, Bryant, Willis, Shelley, Byron, Moore, Hood, Tennyson and Motherwell, quoted at length.
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