Publisher's Synopsis
The situation of American literature is anomalous. It has no centre, or, if it have, it is like that ofthe sphere of Hermes. It is divided into many systems, each revolving round its several suns, andoften presenting to the rest only the faint glimmer of a milk-and-water way. Our capital city, unlikeLondon or Paris, is not a great central heart from which life and vigor radiate to the extremities, butresembles more an isolated umbilicus stuck down as near as may be to the centre of the land, andseeming rather to tell a legend of former usefulness than to serve any present need. Boston, NewYork, Philadelphia, each has its literature almost more distinct than those of the different dialects ofGermany; and the Young Queen of the West has also one of her own, of which some articulaterumor barely has reached us dwellers by the Atlantic.Perhaps there is no task more difficult than the just criticism of contemporary literature. It is evenmore grateful to give praise where it is needed than where it is deserved, and friendship so oftenseduces the iron stylus of justice into a vague flourish, that she writes what seems rather like anepitaph than a criticism. Yet if praise be given as an alms, we could not drop so poisonous a oneinto any man's hat. The critic's ink may suffer equally from too large an infusion of nutgalls or ofsugar. But it is easier to be generous than to be just, and we might readily put faith in that fabulousdirection to the hiding place of truth, did we judge from the amount of water which we usually findmixed with it.Remarkable experiences are usually confined to the inner life of imaginative men, but Mr. Poe'sbiography displays a vicissitude and peculiarity of interest such as is rarely met with. The offspring ofa romantic marriage, and left an orphan at an early age, he was adopted by Mr. Allan, a wealthyVirginian, whose barren marriage-bed seemed the warranty of a large estate to the young poet.
