BOOK REVIEW computer and printer, a technical process that is now well advanced.

Considering the mass of factual matter it con- tains, this volume is a masterpiece of organization and exposition. A series of prefatory essays explain how the catalogue, filmography, and indexes are to be used, with special attention to the main entries, the keys to the abbreviations, and the indexes. The latter include “Illustrators” (names, dates, il- lustrated works cross-referenced to the catalogue entries, plus an appendix for the 215 “Outstanding Illustrators”); “Year of Publication” (a chronol- ogy of the main entries); “Special Editions or For- mats”; and “Poe Titles Illustrated.” In short, as a reference tool this compilation anticipates the key factual questions that users will ask. True, those who look for a list of the best 20, 30, or 50 illus- trations will not find such an inventory, but the data on which to base such judgments are there in Pollin’s technical descriptions (which often include the quality, type, and size of the paper), in his com- ments on the artistic value or insight of the “im- age,” and in his discussions of the quality of “keep- ing” between text and picture. In his introduc- tory history, Pollin discusses Poe’s own preference for “graphicality” or “the true [as represented] by the novel or unexpected,” and for woodcuts over decorative steel engravings. These and other aes- thetic distinctions are traced from the 1852 British edition (the earliest illustrated) through the long line of distinguished artists who have interpreted Poe’s writings visually-Beardsley, Harry Clarke, Re& Clarke, Epstein, Frasconi, Manet, Redon, Magritte, Farneti, Kubin, and Martini, to men- tion a few. The 17 plates reproduced here include three by Darley, two by Beardsley, two by Kubin, and one each by Martini and Dork.

The main “Catalogue” of 1625 entries (pages 39-322) is subdivided by country. Within each country, the entries are arranged chronologically. Each entry represents a published book, a portfo- lio, a separately published print, or a n easel paint- ing. Each volume is identified by serial number, title, country, and (using a system of letter sym- bols where relevant) publication information, ed- itor, translator, illustrator, number and titles of illustrations, location of rare items, and compiler’s commentary on the illustrations as a group, not on each separately, unless there is only one. Pollin’s scholarly knowledge of this field is exemplified by entry 714 on Woodberry’s Life of Poe illustrated by Albert0 Martini and entry 1187 on the 10- volume Works of Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Sted- man and Woodberry and illustrated by Aubrey Beardsley. The “Filmography” (323-59), arranged

Interpreting Poe Visually: A Guide

Burton R. Pollin, compiler. Images of Poe’s Works: A Comprehensive Descriptive Catalogue of IZlusttations. Bibliographies and Indexes in Amer- ican Literature, No. 9. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1989. 440 pp. $49.95.

At the end of his “Acknowledgements” for Images of Poe’s Works, Professor Pollin asks the reader to recognize that this work enters “a territory scarcely charted in its contents and in its meth- ods.” He might have less modestly claimed that this catalogue of illustrations for and film versions of Poe’s writings is both a pioneering effort and a definitive compilation, the result of many years of exhaustive investigation in the United States, Europe (except Bulgaria), and Japan-33 coun- tries, 20 languages, and 150 years of Poe publi- cations. Most impressive is the list of libraries and collections consulted here and abroad and of the granting agencies that supported this research from 1973 to 1988 (xi.). The results, as recorded in this reference work, provide a new basis for stud- ies of the relationship between Poe’s imaginative writings and the illustrations thereof, as well as of the effect of artists’ “images” on our understand- ing of the tales and poems. The illustrations often embody rare and valuable interpretive insights; the fascination they have for the reader is compounded by the nonliteral, symbolic character of Poe’s finest work.

In teaching Poe, who has not shown his students slides or other reproductions by Harry Clarke, Beardsley, Martini, and Magritte? And who has not wished for a record of where to turn for more? Now, with characteristic thoroughness for detail and sources, Professor Pollin has given us in this catalogue and filmography virtually all essential reference data on visual interpretations of Poe. And for scholars and readers who do not have easy library access t o many of the illustrations, he has placed on deposit twelve notebooks of xeroxed copies in the Print Room of the New York Public Library. A logical sequel would be a companion volume of the best 400-500 illustrations in color, if there are that many, done on a color graphics

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alphabetically in terms of the Poe works filmed, including shorts, animated strips, and parodies, similarly uses a set of cue symbols (W, P, L, D, etc.) in its 300 or so entries. A list of alternate titles correlates the name of the Poe work with the commercial title and date of release. An ap- pendix to the filmography lists films based on mis- cellaneous materials, life, and works. All told, the numerical system used in both catalogues, along with the supplemental guides and indexes, would make a comprehensive index superfluous. Only the Introduction lacks any index at all. Prepared by computer “inputting” and laser printing, a process carefully described in the text by Heyward Ehrlich of Rutgers University, the finished book is of high quality in print, binding, and paper stock “com- plying with the Permanent Paper Standard of the NISO.”

The practical uses to which this catalogue can be put are many and various. As noted above, teachers and students will find this index an in- dispensable aid as a finding list, and as a guide to the nature and quality of the images. Those who are working in the relations of art and litera- ture, of history and literature, and in cross-cultural studies will find a wealth of information on artistic qualities, period styles, and national characteris- tics, to mention only a few of the more apparent values. No American author has surpassed Poe in the continuing and varied appeal of his work to visual artists, which has been second only to his influence on writers.

Eric W. Carlson, University of Connecticut, Emeritus

Library of America Poe Editions: Subscriber Discount

Subscribers to Poe Studies/Dark Romanticism are eligible for a 40-percent discount on purchases of either or both of the Poe editions published in the Library of America series: Edgar Allan Poe: Essays and Reviews, ed. G . R. Thompson, and Edgar Allan Poe: Poetry and Tales, ed. Patrick F. Quinn. These volumes, which list retail at $27.50, are priced for our subscribers at $16.50 each. To order, please write directly to Library of America, 14 East 60th Street, New York, NY 10022.

CURRENT POE ACTIVITIES

Organisations and Meetings

Two meetings of the Poe Studies Association have occurred since this column last appeared. The sixteenth annual session, consisting of two programs, took place at the MLA in New Or- leans on December 27 and 28, 1988. Citations naming G. Richard Thompson (Purdue) and J. Lasley Dameron (Memphis State) honorary mem- bers were read by Benjamin Franklin Fisher IV (University of Mississippi). Speakers at the first session, chaired by Glen A. Omans (Temple), were John T. Irwin (Johns Hopkins), “Handedness and the Self in ‘Maelzel’s Chess Player”’; John Michael (University of Rochester), “Reflection and Alterity in Poe’s Doubles”; and J. Lasley Dameron, “Poe’s Concept of Truth.” Lilian Weissberg (Pennsylva- nia) chaired the second program, with presenta- tions by Clayton T. Koelb (University of Chicago), “Poe and the Rhetoric of Terror”; Susan Bernstein (Johns Hopkins), “The Poe Effect”; and J. Gerald Kennedy (LSU), “Poe, Foucault, and Madness.”

The seventeenth annual session, also consist- ing of two programs, was held at the MLA in Washington, D. C., on December 29, 1989. Richard Kopley (Penn State/DuBois) read a ci- tation naming Patrick F. Quinn (Wellesley Col- lege) an honorary member of PSA. Speakers at the first session, chaired by Glen A. Omans, were John Carlos Rowe (UC/Irvine), “Poe and Race in the Antebellum South”; William J. Scheick (University of Texas/Austin), “An Intrinsic Lu- minosity: Poe’s Use of Optical Theories”; and David Leverenz (University of Chicago) , “Poe and Gentry Virginia.” The second session, chaired by Liliane Weissberg, featured Leland S. Per- son, Jr. (Southern Illinois University/Carbondale), “Reading and Composing ‘The Raven”’; James Postema (Concordia), “Formal Pressures in Poe’s Dream Poems”; Marty Roth (University of Min- nesota/Minneapolis) , “Reading Under Erasure: The Poe Text”; and Bruce Krajewski (University of Chicago), “The Simple Hermeneutics of ‘The Purloined Letter.”’ A special Poe session, chaired by Richard Kopley, was also held on December 29 at the MLA. Speakers were James L. Machor (Ohio State/Lima), “Poe’s Criminal Readers”; Martin A. Orzeck (Temple), “Embedded Readers and In- terred Meanings: The Indictment of Audience in ‘The Black Cat’ and ‘The Tell-Tale Heart’”; and Monika M. Elbert (St. John’s University/Staten Island), “‘The Man of the Crowd’ and the Man outside the Crowd: Poe’s Narrator and the Demo-

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