Text: Edgar Allan Poe and Thomas Ollive Mabbott, “James Lawson” The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe — Vol. IV: The Literati of New York City (2026), pp. 101-103 (This material is protected by copyright)

[page 101:]

JAMES LAWSON.(1)

Mr. Lawson has himself made little effort in the field of literary labor, but is distinguished for his zeal and liberality in the good cause. He is by birth a Scotchman, but few men have more ardently at heart the welfare of American letters.

His works, so far as published in volume form, are few. I know only of “Giordano, a tragedy,”(2) and two volumes entitled “Tales and Sketches by a Cosmopolite.”(3) The former was performed some years ago, (at the Park, I believe,) and with no great success. The latter were more popular. One of them, “The Dapper Gentleman's Story,” is a very clever imitation of the manner of Irving, and has “gone the rounds of the press.”

Mr. Lawson is of social habits and warm sympathies. He is enthusiastic, especially in matters of art or taste; converses fluently, tells a capital story, and is generally respected and beloved.

[page 102:]

“Literary American” version of the article on Lawson.

James Lawson.(4)

Mr Lawson has published, I believe, only “Giordano” a tragedy, and two volumes entitled “Tales and Sketches by a Cosmopolite.” The former was condemned (to use a gentle word) some years ago at the Part theatre; and never was condemnation more religiously deserved. The latter are in so much more tolerable than the former that they contain one non-execrable thing — “The Dapper Gentleman's Story” — in manner, as in title, an imitation of one of Irving's “Tales of a Traveller.”

I mention Mr L., however, not on account of his literary labors, but because, although a Scotchman, he has always professed to have greatly at heart the welfare of American letters. He is much in the society of authors and booksellers, converses fluently, tells a good story, is of social habits, and, with no taste whatever, is quite enthusiastic on all topics appertaining to Taste.

[[Notes]]

[page 103:]

1. James Lawson, November 9, 1799 - March 14, 1880, was born in Glasgow, and came to New York in 1815. He retired from the press in 1833, and was in the marine insurance business. The verses by him in Duyckinck are sadly pedestrian. His papers are in NYPL. Lawson is surely the “L —— ” of “Marginalia,” no. 287 (H. xvi, 174) whose play was “scotched, not killed.”

2. Giordano was performed at the Park, November 13, 1828 and later. It was published, New York, 1832 and reprinted, New Haven, 1859; copies are in the NYPL. See Odell, III, 384.

3. Tales and Sketches, New York, 1830 contains the story Poe praised. It tells of a retired linendraper, who came from poverty to wealth without literary education. He planned to publish the poems of a young man who desired his patronage, but changed his mind upon learning that poets do not “keep their works in duplicates.”

4. The text in Griswold's edition, III, 79-80, used an MS which still survives, and is followed by me. Griswold inserted two commas — one after Giordano in the first sentence, after “former” in the third. This was certainly not tampering with the text in any improper fashion. Poe's second version, far less favorable than the first, can be explained. In a letter of December 31, 170, Thomas G. Latto wrote Mrs. Whitman of Lawson along with English and Briggs, as making scandalous charges against our poet.