Edgar Allan Poe — “The Devil in the Belfry”

Reading copy:

• “The Devil in the Belfry” — reading copy

Manuscripts and Authorized Printings:

• Text-01 — “[The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.]” — 1839 (There are no known draft manuscripts or scratch notes reflecting the original effort of composition. Mabbott does not assign a date of composition, but does suggest (T&S, 2:364) that it may have been written specifically for the Saturday Chronicle.)
• Text-02 — “The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.” — 1839
  • Text-02a — “The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.” — 1839, (Speculated faircopy manuscript, prepared for publication in the Saturday Chronicle. This manuscript has not surived, as it was probably destroyed in the process of typsetting, but this version is presumably recorded in Text-02b.)
  • Text-02b — “The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.” — May 18, 1839 — Saturday Chronicle — (Mabbott text A)
• Text-03 — “The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.” — 1839
  • Text-03a — “The Devil in the Belfry. An Extravaganza.” — 1839 — (speculated copy of the Saturday Chronicle with minor corrections by Poe in anticipation of reprinting in TGA. This version is lost, but presumably reflected in text-04. Changes are extensive in number, but very minor in nature, with even the few verbal differences being only a matter of a word or two. It is thus possible that Poe's changes were made in proof of TGA.)
  • Text-03b — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1840— TGA — (Mabbott text B)
  • Text-03c — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1840 — manuscript revision in “Pedder” copy of TGA — (Mabbott text C)  (This version is a modified form of Text-03a, presented to Ann and Bessie Pedder)
• Text-04 — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1842
  • Text-04a — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1842 — TGAPP — (Mabbott text D)  (This version is a modified form of Text-03a)
  • Text-04b — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1843-1845 — (This entry is a speculative intermediary form, TGAPPB, prepared for Tales, although it was not included in the collection, which was published on June 25, 1845. Changes from Text-04a are present in Text-04c, but there are also additional changes in Text-04c, changes of too great a nature to have been made purely in proof. This intermediary form does not appear to have survived, but the changes are presumably recorded in Text-04c. It is possible that Poe made some additional changes in proof.)
  • Text-04c — “The Devil in the Belfry” — November 8, 1845 — Broadway Journal — (Mabbott text E) 
• Text-05 — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1845-1849
  • Text-05a — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1845-1849 — (Speculated copy of the Broadway Journal with changes and corrections marked by Poe. Mabbott chooses this text with the comment that there is “one change” which he presumes is by Poe, although he does not specify what the change is. Most likely, it is the removal of the repetition of “— it is” from the phrase “Min Gott, it is Dirteen o’clock!!” Perhaps a more interesting change is that the several instances of Vondervotteimitiss where the final “s” is omitted, giving an inconsistent spelling, are restored. The question must be if such a slight change of a quirky spelling of a humorous non-English name might have been noticed and made by the typesetters, busily trying to set the text for the new edition.)
  • Text-05b — “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1850 — WORKS — (Mabbott text F)  (This is Mabbott's copy-text)

Reprints:

• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1867 — Prose Tales of Edgar Allan Poe, second series (New York: W. J. Widdleton), pp. 87-95 (This collection is extracted from the 1850-1856 edition of Poe's Works. It was reprinted several times.)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1874 — Works of Edgar A. Poe, edited by J. H. Ingram (vol. II, pp. 299-307) (This collection was subsequently reprinted in various forms)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — January 18, 1874 — Brooklyn Sunday Sun (Brooklyn, NY), vol. I, no. 8, p. 2, cols. 1-3 (acknowleged as by “Edgar Allan Poe.”)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — November 9, 1900 — Geneva Gazette (Geneva, NY), vol. LVI, no. 45, p. 1, cols. 1-3 (acknowleged as by “Edgar Allan Poe.”)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — December 3, 1900 — Fort Smith Times (Fort Smith, Arkansas), vol. XIX, no. 104, p. 3, cols. 3-5 (acknowleged as by “Edgar Allan Poe.”)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — December 6, 1900 — Montour Falls Free Press (Montour Falls, NY), vol. ??, no. ??, p. ?, cols. 1-3 (Poe is acknowleged as the author in a short separate article)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — December 24, 1900 — Daily Illustrated News (Los Angeles, CA), vol. 8, no. 97, p. 19, cols. 1-3 (printed under the general heading of “World Famous Stories” and acknowleged as by “Edgar Allan Poe.”)

Scholarly and Noteworthy Reprints:

• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1894-1895 — The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, vol. 4: Tales, eds. E. C. Stedman and G. E. Woodberry, Chicago: Stone and Kimball (4:103-114) (This collection was subsequently reprinted in various forms)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1902 — The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, vol. 3: Tales II, ed. J. A. Harrison, New York: T. Y. Crowell (3:247-257, and 3:333-335)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1978 — The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe, vol. 2: Tales & Sketches I, ed. T. O. Mabbott, Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press (2:362-378)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 1984 — Edgar Allan Poe: Poetry and Tales, ed. Patrick F. Quinn (New York: Library of America), pp. 298-306

Instream Comparative and Study Texts:

• “The Devil in the Belfry” — Comparative Text (Saturday Chronicle and TGA)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — Study Text (TGA-Pedder)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — Study Text (TGAPP)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — Comparative Text (TGAPP and BJ)
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — Comparative Text (BJ and WORKS)

Miscellaneous Texts and Related Items:

• ”Le diable dans le beffroi” — (French translation by Charles Baudelaire)
• ”Le diable dans le beffroi” — September 20, 1854 — Le Pays
• ”Le diable dans le beffroi” — 1857 — Nouvelles histoires par Edgar Poe, Paris: Michel Lévy frères
• “The Devil in the Belfry” — 2017 — Audio book (unabridged), read by Chris Aruffo

• Bachinger, Katrina E., “The Aesthetics of (Not) Keeping in Step: Reading the Consumer Mobocracy of Poe's ‘The Devil in the Belfry’ against Peacock,” Modern Language Quarterly (1990), 51:513-533.
• Eddings, Dennis W., “Poe's Tell-Tale Clocks,” Baltimore: The Edgar Allan Poe Society, 1994.
• Forbes, Christopher J., “Satire of Irving's A History of New York in Poe's ‘The Devil in the Belfry’,” Studies in American Fiction (1982), 10:93-100.
• Heartman, Charles F. and James R. Canny, A Bibliography of First Printings of the Writings of Edgar Allan Poe, Hattiesburg, MS: The Book Farm, 1943.
• Lynch, James J., “The Devil in the Writings of Irving, Hawthorne, and Poe,” New York Folklore Quarterly (Summer 1952), 8:111-113.
• Mabbott, Thomas Ollive, ed., The Collected Works of Edgar Allan Poe (Vols 2-3 Tales and Sketches), Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1978.
• Weber, Jean-Paul, “Edgar Poe on the Theme of the Clock,” La Nouvelle Revue Francais (August-September 1958), 68:301-311 and 69:498-508.
• Whipple, William, “Poe's Political Satire,” University of Texas Studies in English (1956), 35:81-95.
• Wyllie, John Cooke, “A List of the Texts of Poe's Tales,” Humanistic Studies in Honor of John Calvin Metcalf, Charlottesville: University of Virginia, 1941, pp. 322-338.