I finally made my way to Richmond’s Edgar Allan Poe Museum one bright February morning. (Clearly I’m not yet on board with the instantaneity of blogging; one day the training wheels will come off and I’ll visit, process and write lickety-split. One day.) Since its opening in 1922, the museum has been located in a two-story structure built in 1737 that’s colloquially known as the Old Stone House and touted as the oldest home in Richmond. There’s no evidence that Poe even entered the building during his lifetime, but since none of the buildings with meaningful links to Poe are still standing, this one has as much claim as any other. It’s a charming spot but tiny. Tiny. I opted to take a guided tour, which was quite well done and, in retrospect, pretty essential to making sense of the museum.
The permanent exhibition space consists of three rooms, divided between the Old Stone House and two other small buildings, all of which surround a lovely courtyard garden and the Poe Shrine. A fourth building houses temporary exhibitions, such as a set of searing illustrations of “The Raven” produced by James Carling in the 1880s on view during my visit. The space constraints make telling a cohesive story pretty challenging, especially since a good chunk of that space is filled with large objects (e.g. period furniture from Poe’s boyhood home; an enormous 3-D map of Richmond during his childhood). The museum tilts heavily toward Poe’s youth in Richmond, his tumultuous relationship with the family who adopted him as a toddler after his mother’s death, and his early work at the Richmond-based The Southern Literary Messenger. Poe’s marriage and later career receive some attention, as well as the conflicting theories about his mysterious death at just 40 years old. Although the Richmond story is what they’re best equipped to tell, there were a couple of places where I craved more details. For instance, the label for one daguerreotype explains Poe’s sad and sickly appearance by noting that he had attempted suicide a few days before the portrait. That seems an anecdote worth fleshing out.
Photo of 1848 Cornwell Daguerreotype on view at Poe Museum (image via Wikimedia Commons)
As a visitor, I found this skewed storytelling a bit frustrating, but I recognize that it’s largely a product of Poe’s biography. A lot of places have laid claim to Poe over the years—and with good reason. In addition to the Richmond museum, there’s also one in Baltimore, a cottage in the Bronx operated by the county historical society, and a National Historic Site in the Philadelphia home where Poe lived for six years. Unlike some authors who are indelibly linked to a particular place, Poe identified as a Southerner but lived much of his life elsewhere; in his determination to make a living as a magazine editor—which in and of itself hardly produced a living wage—Poe moved where the opportunities led him, up and down the eastern seaboard and back again. Poe’s story is one of mobility so trying to pin him down to one location means telling a partial story. (Which is not to say that partial stories aren’t worth telling! I’m just fascinated by Poe’s legacy being divvied up among several sites, all premised on his temporary physical presence, and the limitations that places on all of them.) Moreover, his relocations and strained finances mean that the objects connected to Poe are also somewhat limited; images of Poe and his circle are also relatively few since photography gained widespread popularity only in the last years of Poe’s life. One of the most evocative objects on display in Richmond is a trinket box belonging to Poe’s wife, Virginia Clemm Poe. The box was one of the few personal belongings the couple could bring with them from one rented home to another. Letters, documents, poems and stories penned by Poe or about him are much more plentiful, but exhibiting these poses its own set of challenges. Light-sensitive objects cannot be displayed indefinitely and must be rotated. There’s also the question of how to display them in a compelling and accessible way. A room full of tiny text—or handwritten pages!—stuck behind glass would be dreary, indeed.
The Poe Museum does a nice job giving visitors a taste of Poe’s letters and literary output while also humanizing him through personal objects such as a very dapper white silk vest and walking stick. Overall, the permanent exhibition is more likely to elicit a visitor’s sympathy for Poe rather than horror at his twisted mind, in part because graphic details about the darker elements of his poetry and prose are mostly absent. Following his mother’s death from tuberculosis, which sent her three children to three different families, Poe suffered the loss of his adoptive mother, broken engagements, the death of his wife (also from tuberculosis and also at age 24 just like his mum), and ongoing financial struggles. Of course, he also achieved considerable success during his lifetime, gaining international fame with the publication of “The Raven,” and enjoyed a happy marriage—albeit to a cousin who was just 13 years old when they said “I do.” The resulting portrait is deservedly complicated and certainly worth a visit.
While I’ve highlighted the challenges inherent in the museum’s mission, physical site, and (presumably) financial resources, I was also impressed by their efforts to overcome these obstacles. The guided tour provided a much fuller picture of Poe’s life and times than the wall signage, which appeared to have been updated at different times. There’s also an audio tour that can be downloaded to your mp3 player prior to your visit. I asked about the audio tour while I was there, but it sounded like the onsite technology was not entirely reliable. The museum’s website is a great resource, with lots of information about Poe’s life and ties to Richmond, a very robust collections database, links to full texts of his work, lesson plans and activities for school groups, and a lively blog with frequent “Weird Richmond” posts.
To return to my initial questions about juggling Poe’s incredible popularity with the misrepresentations that often underlie it, the exhibition does touch on this to some degree. The case on Poe’s death talks a bit about the misdeeds of Rufus Griswold, Poe’s literary executor, who went to astonishing lengths to ruin his name. A nearby panel discusses Poe’s afterlife in popular culture, which is thriving. (Just ask John Cusack.)The museum also recently added a small case debunking Poe’s reputation as an alcoholic and opium addict, explaining that he was essentially allergic to alcohol and not a habitual opium eater. Given the volume of school groups they receive, I can only imagine the addition was cheered by teachers and chaperones. Of course, the gift shop rightly takes advantage of Poe’s status as a master of chills and thrills. If you’re in need of a raven puppet, it is the place to go!
In Search of Signage 