Page:Edgar Allan Poe - how to know him.djvu/191

Rh good end in view, much may be effected by discriminative criticism on what has already been done. The field, thus stated, is of course, practically illimitable—and to Americans the American drama is the special point of interest. We propose therefore, in a series of papers, to take a somewhat deliberate survey of some few of the most noticeable American plays. We shall do this without reference either to the date of the composition, or its adaptation for the closet or the stage. We shall speak with absolute frankness both of merits and defects—our principal object being understood not as that of mere commentary on the individual play—but on the drama in general, and on the American drama in especial, of which each individual play is a constituent part.

[Thiodolf, by Baron de la Motte Fouqué, reviewed in Graham's Magazine, December, 1846. Fouqué's Undine (1811) Poe considered almost faultless: "It is a model of models in regard to the high artistical talent which it evinces." His only objection was that, though not an allegory, "it has too close an affinity to that most indefensible species of writing." The following review barely mentions Thiodolf but contains a sort of summary of Poe's scattered comments on German literature and literary criticism. Of course both works had been translated before Poe wrote about them.]

This book could never have been popular out of Germany. It is too simple—too direct—too obvious—too bald—not sufficiently complex—to be relished by