WCP4915

Letter (WCP4915.5325)

[1]

Broadstone, Dorset

Jan[uar]y. 15th 1904

E. Marriott, Esq.

Dear Sir:

Thanks for your letter which is quite satisfactory. I had already written a short account of how "Leonaine" came into my hands, and also my view of when it was written, and how it came about that it was never before discovered in America, taking my facts from the sketch of Poe's life given in the volume of Poems you so kindly gave me. I [2] think you will see that the whole of the circumstances are so simple & natural, that I feel sure they must have happened very nearly as I suggest. I have sent back the corrected proof, & it will no doubt appear in "The Fortnightly" next month, as the Editor appeared pleased that I sent it to him.

As you, no doubt, have an opportunity of seeing all the Daily & Weekly papers, which I have not, will you please look out for the notices of "The [3] New Reviews", which usually appear on the 1st. or 2nd. of the month, as it will be very interesting to know how many accept it as undoubtedly Poe's, or whether any declare it to be an imitation. But if an imitation, why did it not appear in at least some of the Californian newspapers? & get copied widely?

Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

P.S. I have written again to California urging my niece to trace out the last places my brother went to before his last illness, as I feel sure he must have got the poem there, & then. Thanks for [4] your offer of a fuller Biography of Poe, but I do not want one now, though if I get important facts from California I may refer to them later on.

A. R. W.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP4915.5325)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Benny, Ruth [2015-03-31] Transcription checked by Benny, Ruth [2015-03-31] Transcription checked by Sherwood, Danni [2020-08-10]

Published letter (WCP4915.5502)

[1]1 [p. 12]

Broadstone, Dorset

Jany. 15th, 1904

E. Marriott, Esq.

Dear Sir:

Thanks for your letter which is quite satisfactory. I had already written a short account of how "Leonaine" came into my hands, and also my view of when it was written, and how it came about that it was never before discovered in America, taking my facts from the sketch of Poe's life given in the volume of Poems you so kindly gave me. I think you will see that the whole of the circumstances are so simple & natural, that I feel sure they must have happened very nearly as I suggest. I have sent back the corrected proof, & it will no doubt appear in "The Fortnightly" next month, as the Editor appeared pleased that I sent it to him.

As you, no doubt, have an opportunity of seeing all the Daily & Weekly papers, which I have not, will you please look out for the notices of "The New Reviews", which usually appear on the 1st. or 2nd. of the month, as it will be very interesting to know how many accept it as undoubtedly Poe's, or whether any declare it to be an imitation. But if an imitation, why did it not appear in at least some of the Californian newspapers? & get copied widely?

Yours very truly,

(signed) Alfred R. Wallace.

P.S. I have written again to California urging my niece to trace out the last places my brother went to before his last illness, as I feel sure he must have got the poem there, & then. Thanks for your offer of a fuller Biography of Poe, but I do not want one now, though if I get important facts from California I may refer to them later on.

(signed) A. R. W.

1
Editor Charles H. Smith's Note: Ninth of fifteen letters in a pamphlet, a background to which is as follows: In 1904 Wallace published a pair of short essays (S612 and S614) describing what he had mistakenly taken to be a previously unknown poem by Edgar Allan Poe. This turned out to be a hoax that had been perpetrated by the Indiana writer James Whitcomb Riley some years earlier. In late 1903 Wallace had entered into a correspondence with the literary figure Ernest Marriott about this matter; sometime later Wallace's part of the correspondence—seventeen letters in all (actually, fifteen separately dated ones)—was collected and turned into a privately printed pamphlet. Who did this and when it was done is unknown, though it could not have taken place any later than 1930 (by which time both Wallace and Marriott were long dead), the date a copy of the pamphlet was added to the New York Public Library's collection.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Published letter (WCP4915.5502)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Smith, Charles Hyde [2013-02-07] Transcription checked by Catchpole, Caroline [2013-02-08]

Please cite as “WCP4915,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP4915