The Philosophy of Composition by Edgar Allan Poe
"The Philosophy of Composition" is a critical essay by Edgar Allan Poe that outlines his approach to writing poetry and literature. In this work, Poe argues that the highest form of literary art is the aesthetic creation of beauty, contrasting it with more didactic and realistic literary forms. He emphasizes that effective literary creation should begin with the intended emotional effect or conclusion, working backward to construct the plot and characters. This method aims to enhance the sense of consequence within the narrative.
Poe uses his famous poem "The Raven" as a case study to illustrate his principles, explaining his choices regarding length, tone, and technique. He advocates for poetry that can be read in a single sitting to maintain unity of impression and focuses on evoking beauty, often through themes of melancholy and sadness. Additionally, he discusses the significance of literary techniques, such as the refrain, which he utilizes to create emotional resonance. Critics have sometimes viewed Poe's rational approach as detached, yet he maintains that the careful crafting of beauty is essential to poetry's purpose.
The Philosophy of Composition by Edgar Allan Poe
Excerpted from an article in Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition
First published: 1846 (collected in The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, 1902)
Type of work: Essay
The Work
From the beginning of his career as a poet, short-story writer, and critic and reviewer, Poe was developing a body of critical doctrine about the nature of literature. Basically, the doctrine assumes that, whereas the lowest forms of literary art are realistic works and works created to illustrate a didactic moral lesson, the highest form of literary art is the aesthetic creation of beauty. Bits and pieces of this theory can be found developing from Poe’s earliest reviews and prefaces. The theory comes together in a unified fashion in Poe’s most extended and famous theoretical statement, “The Philosophy of Composition.”
Poe begins his discussion by asserting that literary works should start with the conclusion or denouement and then work back to the motivation or causes that lead to the “end.” Only in this way, Poe insists, can the writer give the plot an indispensable air of consequence by making both the incidents and the tone contribute to the development of the overall intention. Poe says he always begins with an “effect,” preferably a novel and a vivid one; then he determines what combination of incidents and tone will best aid him in the construction of that effect.
Poe then launches into an extended discussion of “The Raven,” his best-known poem, to illustrate this procedure. The first consideration in the writing of the poem, Poe asserts, was the issue of the length and scope of the work. Poe always argued that a long poem was a contradiction in terms—a long poem is actually a succession of brief ones. His first criterion for the length of a work is that it can be read at a single sitting. If the work is too long to be read at a single sitting, it loses the important effect derivable from unity of impression. Thus, Poe arbitrarily decided to limit his poem to about one hundred lines; “The Raven” is actually 108 lines.
Second, Poe decided on the “impression” or “effect” that he wished to convey. Because for Poe the sole province of all poetry is beauty, he decided that his poem should focus on this universally appreciable effect. Once making that decision, he had to decide on the “tone” of the poem. Because beauty always excites tears in the sensitive person, he concluded that his tone should be one of sadness and melancholy. Having made these decisions about the effect he wished to achieve, Poe then made decisions about what techniques would best bring about these effects. His first decision about method was to make use of the refrain, for it is universally appreciated in poetry, and its impression depends on repetition and a monotone of sound. Although the sound would remain the same, however, the thought conveyed by the sound should constantly vary. Deciding that the best refrain would be a single word, Poe claims that the first word that came to his mind to suggest the melancholy tone he had chosen was the word “nevermore.”
After he made those decisions, Poe says he then decided on a “pretext” for the use of this word in such a manner. This is an important point, for Poe does not begin with the plot, theme, or the so-called personal dilemma of his primary character. Rather, the character and the plot—what one often thinks are the most important elements—are really only a pretext or an excuse for using the techniques that will create the effect that he wants.
Realizing that the monotonous repetition of the word “nevermore” would belie any reasoning person, Poe decided to have an unreasoning creature utter the word; the raven, a bird of ill omen, was the natural choice. Next, Poe decided on the subject of the poem. After admitting that the most melancholy subject is death, Poe then, in one of his famous pronouncements, asserts that the most melancholy subject occurs when death is associated with beauty: “the death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world.”
Readers and critics have often criticized Poe for this essay, arguing that it makes the creation of a poem sound cold-blooded and rational, rather than the stroke of inspiration some would prefer to credit. Poe’s central theoretical assumption, however, is that poetry is the careful creation of beauty and should create pleasure in the reader. Above all, Poe is a formalist for whom the technique and pattern of a poem, not its so-called theme or human interest, is its sole reason for being.
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