Page 53 - Four Famous American Writers: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, James Russell Lowell, Bayard Taylor

From Richmond, Poe went with his family to New York, where Mrs.
Clemm supported the household by keeping boarders. Poe himself spent the

winter chiefly in writing "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym," a tale of
the sea, which was first published by Messrs. Harper and Brothers.

From New York he went to Philadelphia, where he wrote various magazine
articles and stories, and did part of the work of preparing a school textbook

on "Conchology." He soon became associate editor of _The Gentleman’s
Magazine_ with its proprietor Burton. The following year, 1840, his first

volume of stories was published, under the title, "Tales of the Grotesque
and Arabesque." The volume was not a popular success. An edition of
seven hundred and fifty copies was barely disposed of, and all that Poe

received was twenty copies for distribution among his friends.

His connection with Burton’s magazine did not last above a year. Burton
had been a comic actor, and offered prizes which Poe says he never
intended to pay. Poe’s remarks on this transaction caused the rupture.

Poe had already been thinking about starting a periodical of his own, and

now he sent out the prospectus of The Penn Magazine. To found a
magazine which should be better and higher in literary art than any other in
America was his lifelong ambition. He tried again and again to do this, first

with The Penn Magazine, and later with a periodical to be called The
Stylus. He never succeeded, however.

George R. Graham, proprietor of the Saturday Evening Post, now bought
_The Gentleman’s Magazine_, united it with a periodical of his own called

The Casket, and named the new venture _Graham’s Magazine_. Of this Poe
soon became the editor.

After Poe’s death, Mr. Graham published an article in which he said that,
while he was in Philadelphia, Poe seemed to think only of the happiness

and welfare of his family. There were but two things for which he cared to
have money--to give them comforts and to start a magazine of his own. He

never spent any money on himself. Everything was intrusted to Mrs.
Clemm, who managed all his household affairs. His love for his wife was a