Lunchtime Talks at The Rosenbach: Edward Whitley on Whitman’s Poe

Topic

Whitman’s Poe

Over the course of four decades, Edgar Allan Poe had a powerful impact on how Walt Whitman thought about the aesthetics of poetry, the vagaries of fame, the challenges of the literary marketplace, and the politics of literary coteries. Beginning with a brief meeting between the two writers in 1845 and continuing into the 1850s when Poe served as the posthumous “spiritual guide” of the bohemian writers and artists who were Whitman’s closest allies in New York City, Poe’s legacy reappeared at pivotal moments throughout Whitman’s life.

The image above is by Frank Bellew, from the February 6, 1864 issue of Demorest’s New York Illustrated News. It claims to depict the writers and artists at Pfaff’s. Is that the ghost of Poe looking out from the center?

About the Speaker

Edward Whitley teaches courses in American literature at Lehigh University and is currently teaching a course on Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson at The Rosenbach. He has published essays in a variety of academic journals on Walt Whitman and other topics in American literary culture.  His is also the author of American Bards: Walt Whitman and Other Unlikely Candidates for National Poet (North Carolina, 2010), and with Joanna Levin he is the co-editor of Whitman among the Bohemians (Iowa, 2014) and Walt Whitman in Context (Cambridge, 2018). He has contributed to the NEH-funded Walt Whitman Archive (whitmanarchive.org), and, with Robert Weidman, he co-directs The Vault at Pfaff’s:  An Archive of Art and Literature by the Bohemians of Antebellum New York (lehigh.edu/pfaffs).

Sponsor

Lunchtime Talks at The Rosenbach are sponsored by Lenore Steiner and Perry Lerner.

About Lunchtime Talks at The Rosenbach

New! Enjoy In Conversation Programs at midday with leading scholars, artists, and authors talking about their work.

Seating is limited; advance registration is strongly recommended.