End of Youth

This episode of Celebrate Poe delves into an extremely personal and influential time in the writer’s life - basically the end of his youth and decision to leave Richmond to become a writer.  This episode also deals with his relationship with Elmira Royster (his first - and later his last - love.)

The relationship between John Allan and Edgar is explored, as well as some of Edgar’s frustrations about John Allan’s expectations (typical father and son stuff!)



00:00 Intro
01:58 Courting Elmyra
03:57 Reflections on education and schools
05:08 Acceptance by John Allan
11:32 Family status in the South
13:99 Feelings for Elmyra
16:03 Cause for complaint
17:50 Christmas holidays 1826
20:28 Reflections on education and alcohol use
25:48 Young Poe makes a crucial decision
26:40 Letter to John Allan regarding decision
33:07 Future episodes
33:28 Sources
33:50 Outro

Who was Elmyra Roster?
How did Elmyra and Poe “flirt?”
Why might John Allan have pondered the advantages of a professional career?
In reality, what did you think John Allan was most upset about regarding Edgar?
Was Poe particularly worried by his drinking habits at the University?
How would you describe  the letter that Poe wrote to John Allan on March 19, 1827?

Transcript

George Bartley - plain text
Edgar Poe - bold text

00:00 Intro

Welcome to Celebrate Poe.  My name is George Bartley, and this is episode 138 - End of Youth.  The music for the intro and outro for this podcast is from ‘Come Rest in This Bosom’ - said to be Edgar Allan Poe’s favorite song.  Today, this episode will delve into an extremely personal and influential time in the writer’s life.
 
Now, in previous episodes, Celebrate Poe has dealt with Edgar Poe’s time at the University of Virginia from February to December 1826. - certainly an extremely influential period in the writer’s life.  At the University, Poe exceled in Latin and French, as well as incurring gambling debts that John Allan refused to pay. In Poe’s absence his sweetheart Sarah Elmira Royster became engaged to Alexander B. Shelton. 

ENTER GHOST

Hello, Mr. Poe

Greetings, Mr. Bartley

Mr. Poe, during this period life - after your experiences at the University of Virginia - you moved back in with John and Francis Allan.  One might say say that this was a move to a mansion of much better circumstances - a move to a mansion on Main and Fifth Streets. 

01:58 Courting Elmyra

And I developed affections for a young lady by the name of Elmira Royster.  The Royster family lived nearby in a frame house standing across lots, or as it was then, across gardens, on Second Street.

So were you able to see each other from your respective homes?

Ah yes, from my window where I was then living to the back of Elmira’s house there was an unbroken view.  It was the custom of Elmyra and myself to conduct a handkerchief flirtation, me from my window, and my dear Elmira from the casement at the head of the landing on the stairs.

I can just imagine your hearts fluttering with every wave of your romantic signals to each other.

Why Mr. Bartley, I did not realize you had such romantic sentiments.

I am not immune to what you must have felt for Elmira - in your case  waiting for her to look up many a night and seeing the lamp glowing in the room of the young boy she loved.

I can surmise from future occurences - events that you have touched on before in this podcast and events we will also discuss later - that Mr. Royster did not look too favorably upon my obvious intentions towards his daughter.

Now I do think it is fair to say that you had received as good an education as any boy in Richmond.

Not only in private classses and at the University of Virginia - but several years abroad - especially at Stoke Newington.

Yes, and looking back - With the new house, and the higher social status to which John Allan aspired, there seemed to have arisen a different idea as to my possible future and training. My abilities at declamation, and my leaning toward literature and the world of the intellect, may have caused John Allan to ponder the manifest advantages of a professional career.  This might have included the law with perhaps the halls of Congress in view. 

I also find it difficult to believe that John Allan was completely oblivious to the qualities of your mind.

05:08 Acceptance by John Allan

Mr. Bartley - you almost sound like me.  But there was another factor, that should be taken into consideration. A course at the University would take me out of the house, and Mr. Allan had his reasons that caused him to become very anxious at this time that I should be away from him.   Witness his - shall we say - extra marital activities. At any rate, I  was put under the care of private tutors with an early entrance to the University of Virginia.  But I feel his feelings for me were somewhat muted - as though he was a person who was reluctant to accept me as a son.

Why do you say that?

When John Allan permitted Francis to take me into her house and arms as an infant., it was, as we have seen, on his part, somewhat hesitantly. Once the fact was accomplished, however, it must also be said that his initial acceptance of it was more than generous.  When I was a child and I feel to assume that John Allan was fond of children, perhaps my presence as a very young boy  crept very deeply into his affections.  This was to such an extent that there can be little doubt that for many years he accepted me as his son. One may point out these dynamics during my first few years with the Allans. In England, for example, I went by my foster-father’s name, and John Allan made statements to his Scotch relatives that can only indicate that he regarded me then as his heir.

I think that is a fair assumption.

To be honest I was probably a naughty and occassionlly wilful little boy who recieved little harm from any time I was spanked. The situation thus created, however, grew more serious later as a basis for a dangerous family alignment, one which John Allan could not help but resent more than if I had been his own. Some would claim that the charges that John Allan wounded me by constantly reminding me of my dependence upon his charity affected me even more.

Such feelings would seem entirely reasonable on your part.

You know, Mr. Bartley - I have come to believe that as men grow older, the gulf between their temperaments begins to widen. Most men, even of a thick fiber, have a tenderness and fondness, though a hidden one, for little children.  What some might refer to as my appealing childhood no doubt appealed only for a while to John Allan.  But as the boy became more of the man, John Allan felt less and less proud of me because our interests and priorities were quite different.

Thank you for your honesty, Mr. Poe.  I know that reflecting on some of these experiences can be difficult.

And as John Allan increased in years, he seems to have lost, as often happens, some of the more endearing and easily youthful sides of his nature which he undoubtedly, at one time, possessed; and John Allan became harder-grained, and more short-tempered and obstinate.

That ofen happens when we grow older - certainly not always - but those feelings of obstinance can become more obvious in someone like John Allan who was quite strong-willed, and not the most flexible person in the world.

Yes, I feel he was quite incapable of appreciating the possibilities in the more delicate aspects of my personality, and perhaps dissatisfied in a certain way with his wife. He had certainly wronged her, and appeared to become less attached to me.  And as the possessor of a great estate, he was more than ever desirous of a NATURAL heir.

You might say that he felt the young Edgar Poe was getting in the way.

Yes, and when he fell heir to his uncle’s fortune, he treated me as kindly as his gross nature would permit.

Gross nature - those are pretty strong words.

Nevertheless, those are the words I used in writing to describe John Allan.

John Allan DID provide you with a home and education.

But I missed in my foster-father what biographer Hervey Allen describes in Israfel as the sympathy and understanding of a generously responding temperament.

That is well stated.

11:32 Family status in the South

Nevertheless, there were constant speculations about my status as the foster son of a wealthy Southern gentleman. My family moved in the best of Richmond society.

I have no doubt read about some of these people.  Begin from Staunton, I am at least familar with some of the family names because they were so influential as leaders in Staunton and nearby Charlottesville.

Possibly. Some of John Allan’s neighbors were Thomas Taylor, whose daughter William Galt married; Mr. Joseph Tate, Major James Gibbon, Mr. Joseph Marx and Thomas Gilliat. “These gentlemen were of the highest social position in Richmond” and were associates of Chief Justice Marshall, Colonel Ambler, Dr. Brockenbrough, Judge Cabell, Judge Stanard and others, famous for good dinners and whist parties. In such houses I had been welcome as a boy, the associations of such an environment stamped upon me the attitude and the mode of conversation of a gentleman. It was the Virginia of the Old School, a school for manners.

Yes, in earlier episdoes Celebrate Poe discussed how the Allan family traveled several summers to White Sulphur Springs - not as a tourist destination, but basically to join the rest of Southern society - to see and be seen.

This is quite true.  I would surmise that the possibility of my being Mr. Allan’s heir did not escape the speculation of certain feminine matrons with eligible daughters,

I must point out that young people tended to marry much earlier during the early 19th century.

Yes, this is true - and that reminds me of the subject of Elmira.  It was very convenient to slip over to the Royster House nearby and to spend long hours in the parlor with my intended.  Our conversation tended to be of the news of the younger set of the day.  Or she would play the piano and we would sing together.  Sometimes I would accompany her upon the flute which I played quite well, if I must say so myself.

Mr. Poe, I know that you are a ghost, but when you talk about Elmira, you look almost human.

Yes, there were also been certain moments upon the sofa, or upon the window seat on the landing upstairs, when the conversation was of a decidedly endearing nature and more than mere words were exchanged, the reason being that before I left for the University, Elmira had promised to become my wife.  Elmira said that I was quite shy but very handsome, with large dark grey eyes and rather august manners. There was talk of books and poetry, and I also drew pictures and sketches for my sweetheart. These were some of the happiest moments of my life.  Not surprisingly, I promised to write Elmira regularly when I was at the University of Virginia, and she promised to write to me.  I never imagined that her father would intercept those letters - we felt that the other had lost interest - and she married a wealthy man by the name of Shelton.

16:03 Cause for complaint

You could say that this was a time when you saw your boyhood and even future disappearing - if not at the University of Virginia, definitely when you came here when you realized you were not going to be John Allan’s heir.

Yes, I had left the University of Virginia owing sums that John Allan refused to pay.

And you were back in Richmond again.

Except this time I had given John Allan REAL cause for complaint.

Why?

Allow me to explain my predicatment in the following fashion.  My position in the household was essentially uncomfortable. Lawyers were trying to force Mr. Allan to recognize my gambling debts which, it appears, in all totalled about $2500, when the final sums came in. These John Allan resolutely refused to recognize, and his exasperation seems to have been so extreme then - the story is told - that he would not even settle for accounts that were LEGITIMATELY contracted. 

If true, that would seem quite unfair.

17:50 Christmas holidays 1826

Yes, and I felt my position keenly. For my college classmates home for the holidays, it was Christmas and a merry time, but I would scarcely care to see them.

There would be no happy return on a noisy coach to Charlottesville after New Year’s for the coming year. I  was no longer the brilliant young student and sport of my set, with a literary career ahead, but a prodigal whose brief career of glory was over, whose social position with my own friends was compromised by unpaid debts of honor. I was force to hold out for the the dubious prospects of perhaps a place on a stool in the counting house of Ellis & Allan.

I certainly do not envy your situation.

And to make the situation darker, I had not incurred the displeasure of the authorities - some genuinely admired me because of my academic achievements.  My guardian had withdrawn me, not so much because of the “immorality” of my conduct, as on account of his debts.

Ironically, those were debts that he could certainly AFFORD to pay.

If my waywardness been of an inexpensive type I doubt that drastic action would have followed. But the amount of $2500 certainly was inexcusably excessive to to a Scotch ear.

And the case can be made that Mr. Allan was not all that excited about the nature of your education at the University of Virginia.

I quite agree.  At best, Mr. Allan’s enthusiasm over a liberal education for me must have been limited. That limit had already been exceeded during the first and only year of my college education, and, as a consequence, I found myself suddenly very much at home without the future for which I feel I was destined.

At the time, were you worried by your drinking habits at the University.

I admit that alcohol was later a problem in my life, but during my university days, my main concern was that my head was not as hard as the heads of my mates who could carry their liquor better than me. After all - I was just taking part in what was then expected and practised by every live young gentleman at college.  This certainly did not cause me much spiritual dismay.

What did worry and cause me chagrin, perhaps even a feeling of disgrace, was the remembrance that a goodly number of ex-college mates possessed certain I. O. U.’s for not inconsiderable amounts, notes which my foster-father had refused to honor. These in the boy’s eyes were debts of honor; in Mr. Allan’s they were debts of DISshonor. The fact that John Allan’s disappointing and troublesome foster-son might lose prestige among the members of a fast young set, whose good opinion Mr. Allan did not think worth having, especially at a great price, left me unmoved.  On the other hand, like most boys of my age, I probably felt, and valued more keenly, the attitude of my fellows than the opinions of my parents.

No, I must say that any drinking escapades did not cause me a great deal of self reproach at the time. I  could not see those drinking escapades as the evil portents of the future. I admit that I must have been slightly ashamed of the fact that my head was not as hard as the heads of my mates who could carry their liquor better than me.  But in my mind, I was simply taking part in what was then expected and practised by every live young gentleman at college.  I did not realize at the time the pain and misery that alcohol later would cause in my life.

Let’s talk about something more cheerful - what about Christmas holidays that year?

Oh, I do not look on the Christmas holidays of 1826, but as a sober passage.  You see, I feel that those days marked the last passing phase of my boyhood.  Like anyone else in my circumstances, I was now faced with the question of “how shall I earn a living?”  And in my case, doing what I was MEANT to do?  Conditions at home must were had become most uncomfortable and this was definitely felt during the holidays. Some say that during the holidays I went down to my “father’s” plantation, “The Lower Byrd” in Goochland County, to avoid the painful scenes in the big city house, and the trials of seeing my friends depart for the University leaving me behind. In the country, too, I could escape those who were hounding my for his debts, for I was now actually pursued by warrants.

Mr. Poe, I did not realize the situation was that bad.

Oh yes, Mr. Bartley, I was in fact TRAPPED, and it felt that John Allan was taking every occasion to use one of your current phrases to - rub it in. Perhaps John Allan wanted to teach me the value of money by allowing me to remain without any at all, and no means of making any.  And the disagreements and arguments continued.

25:48 Young Poe makes a crucial decision

Finally, on the night of March 18, 1827, I was lying in my bed in my room in the Allan house after a heated discussion - or should I say - argument - with my guardian, when I made the great decision of my life. I decided NOT to submit to John Allan’s dictation of my future, nor to accept the conditions laid down, even if forced out upon the world.

To be honest, Mr. Poe - your choice was bound to bring pain to quite a few people - but literature would agree that it was a brave and wise decision. The possibility of fame and honor - as well as poverty and starvation -  had deliberately been chosen to easy wealth. And our culture has been made much richer because of your literary committment.

Literary committment - I find great pleasure in that phrase.

26:40 Letter to John Allan regarding decision

But before I take my leave,  I beg your indulgence by allowing me to read from a letter I wrote to John Allan in Richmond on March 19, 1827 - remember that this was the year after I left the University of Virginia.

Sir,
After my treatment on yesterday and what passed between us this morning, I can hardly think you will be surprised at the contents of this letter. My determination is at length taken — to leave your house and indeavor to find some place in this wide world, where I will be treated — not as you have treated me — This is not a hurried determination, but one on which I have long considered — and having so considered my resolution is unalterable — You may perhaps think that I have flown off in a passion, & that I am already wishing to return; But not so — I will give you the reason[s] which have actuated me, and then judge —
Since I have been able to think on any subject, my thoughts have aspired, and they have been taught by you to aspire, to eminence in public life — this cannot be attained without a good Education, such a one I cannot obtain at a Primary school —

A collegiate Education therefore was what I most ardently desired, and I had been led to expect that it would at some future time be granted — but in a moment of caprice — you have blasted my hope because forsooth I disagreed with you in an opinion,  Again, I have heard you say (when you little thought I was listening and therefore must have said it in earnest) that you had no affection for me —
You have moreover ordered me to quit your house, and are continually upbraiding me with eating the bread of Idleness, when you yourself were the only person to remedy the evil by placing me to some business — You take delight in exposing me before those whom you think likely to advance my interest in this world —
You suffer me to be subjected to the whims & caprice of your family, — these grievances I could not submit to; and I am gone. I request that you will send me my trunk containing my clothes & books as the last call I shall make on your bou[nty],
To prevent the fulfillment of the Prediction you this morning expressed, send me as much money as will defray the expences of my passage to some of the Northern cit[i]es & then support me for one month, by whic[h] time I [sh]all be enabled to place myself [in] some situation where I may o[bt]ain a livelihood — Send my trunk &c to the Court-house Tavern, send me I entreat you some money immediately — as I am in the greatest necessity — If you fail to comply with my request — I tremble for the consequence
Yours
Edgar A Poe

It depends upon yourself if hereafter you see or hear from me

Mr. Bartley, this has been an most intense podcast episode regarding my emotions.

Mr. Poe - I don’t know how to thank you enough.  You delved into areas about your youth and relationship with your father that are extremely personal, and I appreciate your soul searching.

With your kindest intermission, Mr. Bartley, I must take my leave.   Farewell.

GHOST LEAVES SOUND

The period after Edgar Poe’s return from the University of Virginia in 1826 was a truly pivotal point in his life.  It marked the end of Poe’s life as a youth as the tension between the foster father and son came to a head after a series of quarrels.  Many Poe scholars have come to the conclusion that this period was one of the most dramatic points in the life of Edgar Allan Poe, and marked a decision on Poe’s part that made all the difference.

In conclusion, I would like to say a few words about the Netflix movie version of The Pale Blue Eye - the movie debuts in theatres this December - its first online trailer dropped last week - and the movie deals with the young Poe at West Point - a fascinating period that Celebrate Poe will delve into next year.  

Listeners to Celebrate Poe probably know that I really enjoyed the book by Louis Bayard - I think it is one of the best I have ever read - and while I can’t really vouch for a movie that hasn’t been released and I haven’t seen yet, if it is anything like the book - and it looks like it is - then The Pale Blue Eye should be a fascinating experience.  There should definitely be more about the subject later in this podcast.  I think I am going to read The Pale Blue Eye for the second time - it is THAT good.

33:07 Future episodes

Next week this podcast will take a look at Poe’s first published work - how it came about, what inflenced its writing, and some of its content. So join Celebrate Poe for The Most Valuable American Book.

33:28 Sources

Sources include Poe: A Critical Biography by Arthur Hobson Quinn, POE, POE, POE, POE, POE, POE, POE by Daniel Hoffman, Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never Ending Remembrance by Kenneth Silverman, and Israfel by Hervery Allen.

33:50 Outro

Thank you for listening to Celebrate Poe - a deep dive into the life, times, and works of America’s Shakespeare - Edgar Allan Poe.

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