EDGAR ALLAN POE TAMERLANE1 KIND solace in a dying hour! 2 Such, father, is not (now) my theme — 8 I will not madly deem that power 1 Tamerlane,' which first appeared in 1827 in Tamerlane and Other Poems, was entirely re-written for Poe's volume of 1829, Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and Minor Poems. The text of the poem as here given is practically that of 1829. It follows the edition of 1845 (as given in the Virginia and Stedman-Woodberry editions of Poe's works), but the differences of this edition from that of 1829 are confined (with one exception) to matters of punctuation and typography. The edition of 1831 offers somewhat greater variations, all of which are carefully recorded in the notes of both the Virginia and the Stedman-Woodberry editions. The version of 1827 is given complete in the notes to both these editions, and may also be found in Mr. R. H. Shepherd's complete reprint of the 1827 volume (London, 1884). The subject of the poem, not very clear at first reading, is the evil triumph of ambition over love, illustrated in the career of the Mogul emperor Tamerlane, who, according to the story as conceived by Poe, was born a shepherd, left his mountain home and his early love for the conquest of the eastern world, and returned only to find that his love had died of his neglect. The well-worn device of a death-bed narrative to the conventional friar is lamely excused by Poe in his first note to the 1827 edition: How I shall account for giving him "a friar" as a death-bed confessor, I cannot exactly determine. He wanted some one to listen to his tale-and why not a friar? It does not pass the bounds of possibility, quite sufficient for my purpose, -and I have at least good authority on my side for such innovations.' 2 The beginning of the poem is somewhat clearer in the 1827 version: I have sent for thee, holy friar: 'But 't was not with the drunken hope, To shun the fate, with which to cope The gay wall of this gaudy tower Grows dim around me-death is near. I had not thought, until this hour When passing from the earth, that ear Of any, were it not the shade Of one whom in life I made All mystery but a simple name, Bow'd down in sorrow, and in shame. 3 Poe's own somewhat peculiar punctuation is followed throughout, as given in the Virginia edition of Poe's Works. Faithfulness to this punctuation, about which Poe was particular, makes the Virginia edition, in text, superior to all others. Of Earth may shrive me of the sin Unearthly pride hath revell'd inI have no time to dote or dream: You call it hope that fire of fire! It is but agony of desire: If I can hope-O God! I can Its fount is holier - more divine Know thou the secret of a spirit Thy withering portion with the fame, I have not always been as now: The fever'd diadem on my brow ΤΟ 20 I claim'd and won usurpingly. Hath not the same fierce heirdom given 30 Rome to the Cæsar- this to me? The heritage of a kingly mind, And a proud spirit which hath striven Triumphantly with human kind. While the red flashing of the light From clouds that hung, like banners, o'er, Appeared to my half-closing eye The pageantry of monarchy, And the deep trumpet-thunder's roar Came hurriedly upon me, telling 50 Of human battle, where my voice, My own voice, silly child!—was swelling (O! how my spirit would rejoice, And leap within me at the cry) The battle-cry of Victory! The rain came down upon my head Unshelter'd and the heavy wind 60 Of empires-with the captive's prayer- My passions, from that hapless hour, I have no words-alas! - to tell shadows on th' unstable wind: 80 My mind with double loveliness.1 1 The last two paragraphs, twenty-seven lines in all, should be compared with the corresponding paragraphs (numbered vii and viii) in the version of 1827, which contain seventy-one lines, in order to appreciate the greater condensation and strength of the 1829 version. The advance which Poe made between these two versions, the way in which he found himself,' is strikingly illustrated by the characteristic suggestiveness, beauty, and perhaps vagueness of expression in these two paragraphs as they now stand. 1 These ten lines have taken the place of ninetythree lines (sections xi-xiv) in the 1827 edition. 2 I believe it was after the battle of Angora that Tamerlane made Samarcand his residence. It became for a time the seat of learning and the arts. (PoE, 1827.) 3 He was called Timur Bek as well as Tamerlane. (POE, 1827.) And, failing in thy power to bless, But leav'st the heart a wilderness! Idea! which bindest life around With music of so strange a sound And beauty of so wild a birthFarewell! for I have won the Earth. When Hope, the eagle that tower'd, could see No cliff beyond him in the sky, His pinions were bent droopinglyAnd homeward turn'd his soften❜d eye.1 190 'T was sunset: when the sun will part There comes a sullenness of heart To him who still would look upon The glory of the summer sun. That soul will hate the ev'ning mist So often lovely, and will list To the sound of the coming darkness (known To those whose spirits harken) as one What tho' the moon - the white moon And boyhood is a summer sun I reach'd my home-my home no more And, tho' my tread was soft and low, 200 210 220 At this point the story is given more clearly in the version of 1827: My eyes were still on pomp and power, My wilder'd heart was far away Father, I firmly do believe - 1 I know for Death who comes for me From regions of the blest afar, Where there is nothing to deceive, 230 Hath left his iron gate ajar, And rays of truth you cannot see Are flashing thro' EternityI do believe that Eblis hath A snare in every human path — Else how, when in the holy grove I wandered of the idol, Love, Who daily scents his snowy wings With incense of burnt offerings From the most unpolluted things, Whose pleasant bowers are yet so riven Above with trellic'd rays from Heaven No mote may shun- no tiniest flyThe light'ning of his eagle eye How was it that Ambition crept, Unseen, amid the revels there, Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt In the tangles of Love's very hair? 1821?-1829.2 ΤΟ 240 1827, 1827. I SAW thee on thy bridal day- And in thine eye a kindling light That blush, perhaps, was maiden shame 1 This last paragraph of the poem was added in the edition of 1829. 2 In his preface to the original edition of Tamerlane, Poe says: The greater part of the poems which compose this little volume were written in the year 18211822, when the author had not completed his fourteenth year. This statement is not to be trusted implicitly. But even if we assign the composition of these poems to the latest possible date, 1826-1827, the early development of their author seems hardly the less remarkable; for he would then be only seventeen or eighteen years old. Keats was almost twenty-two at the time when his first volume was published. Both in promise and in actual performance,' says Mr. Shepherd in his preface to the 1884 reprint of Tamerlane and Other Poems (quoted by Mr. Harrison), 'it may claim to rank as the most remarkable production that any English-speaking or English-writing poet of this century has published in his teens.' Poe was only eighteen years old when the volume was published, and it is interesting to note that the printer and publisher of the book, Calvin Thomas of Boston, was then only nineteen years old. 3 This song was introduced in the second part of Al Aaraaf' as being sung to summon the spirit of music, or better the spirit of universal harmony. One of the most beautiful of Poe's tales, called 'Ligeia,' is an even finer embodiment of this conception. Mr. Thomas Wentworth Higginson gives in his Short Studies of American Authors some vivid reminiscences of the evening when Poe read Al Aaraaf' to an audience in Boston. The story is told in more condensed form in Higginson and Boynton's Reader's History of American Literature, page 214: The verses had long since been printed in his youthful volume ... and they produced no very distinct impression on the audience until Poe began to read the maiden's song in the second part. Already his tones had been softening to a finer melody than at first, and when he came to the verses, Ligeia! Ligeia! My beautiful one! his voice seemed attenuated to the faintest golden thread; the audience became hushed, and, as it were, breathless; there seemed no life in the hall but his ; and every syllable was accentuated with such delicacy, and sustained with such sweetness, as I never heard equaled by other lips. When the lyric ended, it was like the ceasing of the gypsy's chant in Browning's "Flight of the Duchess; " and I remember nothing more, except that in walking back to Cambridge my comrades and I felt that we had been under the spell of some wizard. Indeed, I feel much the same in the retrospect, to this day.' Which thy vigilance keep— The sound of the rain Which leaps down to the flower, And dances again In the rhythm of the shower From the growing of grass At the many star-isles That enjewel its breast Where wild flowers, creeping, On its margin is sleeping Full many a maid Some have left the cool glade, and 40 50 60 70 1829 ? ROMANCE 1829. ROMANCE, who loves to nod and sing, With drowsy head and folded wing, Among the green leaves as they shake Far down within some shadowy lake, To me a painted paroquet --- Hath been a most familiar bird - Of late, eternal Condor years |