811-3
87418

V.3

ENTERE According to Act of Congress, in the year 1850, by J. S. REDFIELD,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court, for the Southern District of New York.

GEORGE H. COLTON,.

N. P. WILLIS,.

WILLIAM M. GILLESPIE,.

CHARLES F. BRIGGS,.

WILLIAM KIRKLAND,.

JOHN W. FRANCIS,.

ANNA CORA MOWATT,.

GEORGE B. CHEEVER,..

CHARLES ANTHON,.

RALPH HOYT,.

GULIAN C. VERPLANCK,

FREEMAN HUNT,..

PIERO MARONCELLI,.

LAUGHTON OSBORN,..

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK,.

ANN S. STEPHENS,..

EVERT A. DUYCKINCK,.

PAGE.

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24

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34

35

87

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44

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52

53

56

62

63

RUFUS W. GRISWOLD AND THE POETS,.

MR. LONGFELLOW AND OTHER PLAGIARISTS,.

MR. LONGFELLOW, MR. WILLIS, AND THE AMERICAN DRAMA,.

249

253

257

262

272

275

283

292

334

LONGFELLOW'S BALLADS,....

363

J. RODMAN DRAKE AND THOMAS MOORE-FANCY AND IMAGINATION,.... 374

THE LITERATI.

[In 1846, Mr. Poe published in The Lady's Book a series of six articles, enti-

tled "The Literati of New-York City," in which he professed to give

"some honest opinions at random respecting their autorial merits, with

occasional words of personality." The series was introduced by the fol

lowing paragraphs, and the personal sketches were given in the order in

which they are here reprinted, from "George Bush" to "Richard Adams

Locke." The other notices of American and foreign writers, were con-

tributed by Mr. Poe to various journals, chiefly in the last four or five

years of his life.]

In a criticism on Bryant I was at some pains in pointing out the

distinction between the popular "opinion" of the merits of cotempo-

rary authors, and that held and expressed of them in private literary

society. The former species of "opinion" can be called "opinion"

only by courtesy. It is the public's own, just as we consider a book

our own when we have bought it. In general, this opinion is adopt-

ed from the journals of the day, and I have endeavored to show that

the cases are rare indeed in which these journals express any other

sentiment about books than such as may be attributed directly or

indirectly to the authors of the books. The most "popular," the

most "successful" writers among us, (for a brief period, at least,)

are, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, persons of mere address,

perseverance, effrontery--in a word, busy-bodies, toadies, quacks.

These people easily succeed in boring editors (whose attention is

too often entirely engrossed by politics or other "business" mat-

ter) into the admission of favorable notices written or caused to

be written by interested parties—or, at least, into the admission

of some notice where, under ordinary circumstances, no notice

would be given at all. In this way ephemeral "reputations" are