Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - Works - Editions

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This volume was issued about July 11, 1848. (Arrangements for publication had been made with Putnam by May 23, 1848, when Poe signed a promissory note for a loan, to be repaid from the proceeds of Eureka.) The earliest reviews appear in the Morning Express (New York) and the Commercial Advertiser (New York) of July 12, 1848. The copy provided to the Clerk's Office for copyright was deposited on July 31, 1848.

Eureka: A Prose Poem (1848)

Title page and contents

The number of copies printed is uncertain. Although Poe dearly wanted an edition of 50,000 copies, apparently only 500 were printed. The suggestion is made on occasion that in this work, Poe is being satirical or hoaxing, but the evidence strongly shows that Poe took his essay on cosmology very seriously indeed (aside from the intentionally humorous material in the first section). In a letter of July 7, 1849 to Mrs. Clemm, Poe wrote: “I have no desire to live since I have done ‘Eureka.’ I could accomplish nothing more.”

The Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Adverister for September 13, 1848 lists as a new publication “EUREKA; or, the Pyscial and Metaphysical Universe, A Prose Poe. By EDGAR A. POE. 12mo. 4s 6d. London: John Chapman, 142 Strand.” It is not clear if Chapman actually printed a separate edition or was merely selling copies printed by Putnam. No copy bearing Chapman's imprint has been located.

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Bibliographic Data:

12mo (7 3/8 in x 5 1/16 in). Pages [1] - 143, plus advertisements. Binding: Black cloth, of two varieties.

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Census of Copies:

There are so many surviving copies of these volumes that a complete listing is impractical and unnecessary. This census records copies of special interest. The provenance of each entry is established as authoritatively as possible, given the sketchy and often convoluted bits of information available. In nearly all cases, the chain of owners has gaps, especially among the early owners, whose names are generally known only if the owner left an inscription.

Copies annotated by Poe:

Susan Jaffe Tane, private collector, New York. (Poe's own copy, heavily annotated in his own hand.) The list of prior owners is as follows: 1. Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849); 2. Rufus Wilmot Griswold (1815-1857), New York editor and Poe's literary executor (presumably sent to Griswold by Poe's aunt, Maria Clemm) 3. George Henry Moore (1823-1892) (as executor of Griswold's estate) (In the a column of “Literariana” in Roundtable, June 4, 1864 appears a comment on this copy as “a curious relic of Poe in our possession,” quoting two of the longer notes added by Poe in manuscript. The person who wrote this is not known, although it might be Charles H. Sweetser, who was one of the editors) 4. William Evarts Benjamin (1859-1940) (noted by Stedman and Woodberry in their general preface, dated October 1894, as then “being on the shelves” of Wm. E. Benjamin, a younger son of Park Benjamin (1809-1864), who had actually known Poe); 5. George T. Maxwell, New York collector (sold at Libbie and Co. in Boston on April 23, 1895, item 434, for $69); 6. John Fletcher Hurst (1834-1903), Madison, New Jersey, president of Drew Theological Seminary (sold March 20, 1905 for $530); 7. Stephen H. Wakeman; 8. A. W. S. Rosenbach; 9. Mrs. Florence Meyer Blumenthal (1875-1930) of Paris; 10. Gabriel Wells, New York bookseller, (purchased in March or April 1933 along with the Blumenthal's entire collection, paying $50,000 for all items — it is listed in the bibliography of Wells's collection printed in the American Book Collector for April 1933, p. 246); 11. H. Bradley Martin (Martin purchased the entire collection of Poe material offered by Wells about 1940) (the H. B. Martin collection was sold January 30-31, 1990 at Sotheby auction in New York), where this copy was item 2212); 12. Stephen Lowentheil, 19th Century Shop, Baltimore; 13. Susan Jaffe Tane (purchased about 1993 for $120,000) (A beautiful and remarkably faithful facsimile of this copy was made in 1928 in Paris, in an edition of 50 copies. It is occasionally mistaken for the original. Stuart and Susan F. Levine, 2004, misleadingly lists the original as being in the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York, where they may have examined it since H. Bradley Martin kept some of his Poe materials on deposit at the Pierpont Morgan Library. Because publication of their Eureka was unexpectedly delayed for more than a decade, Martin had died and his collection had been sold at auction many years before the imprint date; This combination of events may explain why Martin's name is not mentioned in the acknowledgments. It is also possible that they examined one of the facsimiles, which would have avoided a lot of handling of the original.) (The Sotheby catalog of 1990 perpetuates a bibliographical error concerning this copy. Following information originally published by Heartman and Canny in 1943, the name of Price is added to the list of owners, which the Sotheby cataloger suggests as possibly being Peirce. While there was an annotated copy of Eureka in the Peirce sale of 1903, it was actually in the part of that sale of material from the collection of William Nelson, and is the copy now at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin.)
J. K. Lilly Library, University of Indiana (Sarah H. Whitman's copy, with Poe's annotations, probably from September or October of 1848). The inscription reads: “To Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman from the most sincere of her friends, Edgar A. Poe.” The list of prior owners is as follows: 1. Sarah Helen Whitman; 2. Miss Charlotte F. Dailey and Mrs. Henry R. Chace, Providence, RI (inherited from Mrs. Whitman); 3. Max Harzof, New York bookdealer (purchased from Miss Dailey and Mrs. Chace in 1930 for $20,000. Harzof offered the collection about August of 1930 to Owen D. Young for $65,000, but Young declined due to the effect of the Depression on his finances); 4. J. K. Lilly (Shipped to Lilly on September 10, 1930 for $50,000, paid in four installments, making the final payment on December 1, 1930); 5. Lilly Library (donated by Lilly in 1956)
Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin (another copy with Poe's own annotations) (formerly from the collection of William H. Koester) William Nelson (1847-1914), of Patterson, NJ (stated by Nelson as having been “bought at a stall on Fourth avenue, New York” with Nelson “paying a quarter for it”) (Although listed as item 974 in the 1903 auction, it apparently did not sell and was retained by Nelson. An auction of April 16-17, 1914 included only letters. The book sold at another Nelson auction, Nov. 22, 1915, item 1000, for $32.50); David Gage Joyce (1885-1937) of Chicago, IL (his library sold February 13-14, 1923, where the book was item 639, noted as in a half morocco slip case and with the back of the book slightly repaired, also states that there are “over 100 pencil notations and corrections on the margins”); Thomas Ollive Mabbott (purchased at the sale in 1923) (Mabbott notes that “the first fly-leaf was torn out when I got the book in 1923”); Francis Joseph Hogan (1877-1944) (collection sold January 24, 1945, where the book is item 581); William Herman Koester (1887-1965)
Alderman Library, University of Virginia (Mary Osborne's copy, sent by Poe on July 15, 1848, with Poe's annotations. Gift of Clifton Waller Barrett, about April 19, 1952)

Other copies:

Bayard Taylor copy. (Poe Foundation, Richmond, VA). (This copy is signed by Bayard Taylor.) The list of prior owners is as follows: 1. Bayard Taylor; 2. Charles B. Foote; 3. Stephen H. Wakeman; 4. John Fleming; 5. 19th Century Shop; 6. Susan Jaffe Tane (purchased about 1991 for $7,500); 6. Poe Foundation, Richmond, VA (given to the museum by Susan J. Tane in 2024)
George Lippard copy. (Currently in the Gimbel Collection, Philadelphia Free Public Library.) (This copy was offered for sale by Dr. Abraham Simon Wolf Rosenbach in 1947 for $785 (Item 477). It contains the following statement, in the hand of George Lippard, on the dedication page: “Presented to me by Poe, when we parted, and when I saw him last. G. L.” Although it is listed as a “presentation copy” in the catalogue, the book does not contain an inscription by Poe. Lippard was one of Poe's close friends, living in Philadelphia. He last saw Poe in 1849, a few months prior to Poe's death.)
Charles West Thomson copy. (Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin). (This copy is signed by Thomson.) This copy is listed by Charles F. Heartman in a catalog dated September 1941 (p. 21), where it is noted as “A superlative copy. With the autograph of the Pennsylvania poet, Charles West Thomson, on flyleaf.” (The price noted is $345.00.) (The autograph is apparently rendered with initials: “C. W. Thomson”)
Robert Barry Coffin copy. (Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin). (This copy is signed by Coffin, and dated 1848 (Coffin (1826-1886) wrote under the pseudonym of Barry Gray. For some unknown reason, he seems to have generally given his name as R. B. B. Coffin.) (This copy was later owned by Edward Hubert Litchfield (1879-1949), whose library was sold in 1951) (Interestingly, Coffin died in Fordham, NY, although he appears to have moved there only about the time of the Civil War)

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Bibliography:

American Art Association Auction Catalogue, The Stephen H. Wakeman Collection of Books of Nineteenth Century American Writers, April 1924 (items 954 and 955).
Blanck, Jacob, “Edgar Allan Poe,” Bibliography of American Literature; volume 7: James Kirke Paulding to Frank Richard Stockton, New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1983, p. 122. (Volume 7 is edited and completed by Virginia L. Smyers and Michael Winship.) (This book is item 16153.)
Collins, William F., “A Private Library of New Jersey; Some Account of the Collection of Mr. William Nelson of Paterson,” Literary Collector; vol. 6, no. 4, August 1903, pp. 101-108 (reprinted from the Newark Sunday News)
Heartman, Charles F., “A Remarkable Addition to the Poe Census,” American Book Collector, vol. III, no. 4, April 1933, 3:246
Heartman, Charles F. and James R. Canny, A Bibliography of First Printings of the Writings of Edgar Allan Poe, Hattiesburg, Mississippi, 1940, pp. 86-87.
Heartman, Charles F. and James R. Canny, A Bibliography of First Printings of the Writings of Edgar Allan Poe, Hattiesburg, Mississippi, 1943 (revised edition), pp. 121-124. (Reprinted, Millwood, New York: Kraus Reprint Co., 1977.)
Levine, Stuart and Susan F., eds., Eureka, Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2004 (Poe's text, edited and with an introduction, notes and textual variants)
Nelson, Roland W., “Apparatus for a Definitve Edition of Eureka,” Studies in the American Renaissance 1978, pp. 161-204.
19th Century Bookshop sale Catalogue, The Poe Catalogue, Baltimore, 1992, pp. 83-86. (Page 84 features a photograph of the final page of Eureka, heavily annotated in Poe's hand. The catalogue lists 5 copies of Eureka as items 206-210. Poe's own copy is listed for $125,000. The remaining copies are listed from $3,200-7,500.)
Quoth the Raven: Selections from the Susan Jaffe Tane Edgar Allan Poe Collection, 1997, pp. 68-69. (Page 68 features a photograph of the final page of Eureka, heavily annotated in Poe's hand.)
Randall, David A., The J. K. Lilly Collection of Edgar Allan Poe: An Account of Its Formation, Indiana: The Lilly Library, 1964, pp. 39-42. (These pages provide a history of Lilly's acquisition of the S. H. Whitman collection, including her copy of Eureka, inscribed and annotated by Poe.)
Southeby Auction Catalogue, The Library of H. Bradley Martin: Highly Important American and Children's Literature, New York, January 30 and 31, 1990, item 2212.
Tane, Susan Jaffe and Gabriel Mckee, Evermore: The Persistence of Edgar Allan Poe, New York: The Golier Club, 2014, item 61.

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Eureka: A Prose Poem (1848)

Bibliographic Data:

Census of Copies:

Bibliography: