Jackson, David K.

English

eGrove (Univ. of Mississippi)

Studies in English, New Series Volume 2 Article 14 1981 Another Reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box” David K. Jackson Durham, North Carolina Follow this and additional works at: https://egrove.olemiss.edu/studies_eng_new  Part of the American Literature Commons Recommended Citation Jackson, David K. (1981) "Another Reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box”," Studies in English, New Series: Vol. 2 , Article 14. Available at: https://egrove.olemiss.edu/studies_eng_new/vol2/iss1/14 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Studies in English at eGrove. It has been accepted for inclusion in Studies in English, New Series by an authorized editor of eGrove. For more information, please contact egrove@olemiss.edu. ANOTHER REPRINT OF POE’S “THE OBLONG BOX”DAVID K. JACKSONDURHAM, NORTH CAROLINATo the one reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box” appearing in the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper for 28 August 1844, which was recorded by Thomas Ollive Mabbott,1 may now be added another, in the Western Literary Messenger: A Family Journal, Devoted to Litera- ture, Science, Art, Morality and General Intelligence (1841-1857) for Saturday, 7 September 1844 (4: 57-59).2 One of the Messenger's editors and proprietors, Jesse Clement, reported that the circulation of this Buffalo, New York, weekly was about three thousand copies a week in February 1845. In 1849, a year after its conversion to a monthly, subscribers were to be found as far away as Ohio and Michigan and “other Western states.” In the interests of “the highest economy” J. S. Chadbourne, the founder, in 1845 desired to dispose “of one-half of the establishment [the Messenger] to some enterprizing and worthy young man — a practical printer — with a few hundred dollars capital, either in cash or in printing materials.” Both Chadbourne and fellow poet Jesse Clement edited the weekly in 1845 and both contributed to the Southern Literary Messenger, published monthly in Richmond, Virginia.3 Chadbourne left Buffalo for Cincinnati, Ohio, about June 1845, and Clement became sole editor and part owner. Poe’s “The Oblong Box,” the lead story in the Western Literary Messenger for 7 September 1844, had this heading:From the Lady’s Book for September.THE OBLONG BOX. BY EDGAR A. POE.1Jackson: Another Reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box”Published by eGrove, 1981110 ANOTHER REPRINT OF POE’S “THE OBLONG BOX”NOTES1 Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Tales and Sketches (Cambridge, Mass., 1978), 3: 922.2 I am indebted to my niece, Mrs. Amos B. Taggart, of Buffalo, N. Y., for locating a file of the Western Literary Messenger and to Mr. W. H. Loos, Curator, Rare Book Room, Buffalo and Erie County Library, Buffalo, N. Y., for finding this reprint and directing my attention to a brief sketch of the Messenger in W. A. Ferris, Life in the Rocky Mountains: A Diary of Wanderings on the Sources of the Rivers Missouri, Columbia, and Colorado from February 1830 to November 1835, ed. Paul C. Phillips (Denver, Col., 1940), pp. xxiv-xxix, and to Frank Luther Mott, A History of American Magazines, 1850-1865 (Cambridge, Mass., 1938), p. 116.3 In a brief notice of the January 1849 Southern Literary Messenger Poe is described as a “northern” contributor to that magazine (Western Literary Mes­senger for February 1849, 11: 299).In a letter in the 25 January 1845 issue of the Western Literary Messenger “Pi Kappa Rho” charged H. W. Longfellow with plagiarism. See Sidney P. Moss, Poe’s Literary Battles: The Critic in the Context of His Literary Milieu (Durham, N. C., 1963), pp. 161-162. A second letter from “Pi Kappa Rho” appeared in the Messenger for 22 February 1845 (4: 238).Recently Dwight Thomas has found a reprint of “The Raven” in the 22 Febru­ary 1845 issue (4: 237-238) and Jesse Clement’s review of The Raven and Other Poems in the 10 January 1846 issue (5: 360).2Studies in English, New Series, Vol. 2 [1981], Art. 14https://egrove.olemiss.edu/studies_eng_new/vol2/iss1/14

Another Reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box”

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Another Reprint of Poe’s “The Oblong Box”

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