Narrator (unnamed) - The narrator in this story is chiefly an observer, but integral to connecting the
two parts of the story as he outlives his wife.
Morella - The main protagonist, the wife of the narrator.
Morella - The daughter of Morella and the narrator. She is named only years after her mother has
died.
Setting:
Location - Under development.
Date - Under development.
Summary:
Under development.
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Reading and Reference Texts:
Reading copy:
“Morella” — reading copy
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Historical Texts:
Manuscripts and Authorized Printings:
Text-01 — “Morella” — about 1835 — unfinished
“Simmons” manuscript — (Mabbott text A) (This is Mabbott’s copy-text for this early version)
Text-02 — “Morella” — 1835 — no original manuscript of the complete form, or
fragments, are known to exist (but this version is presumably recorded in Text-03)
Text-03 — “Morella” — April 1835 — Southern
Literary Messenger — (Mabbott text B)
Text-04 — “Morella” — about 1839 — (although these pages in the Duane copy of the
Southern Literary Messenger show no sign of changes, the version published in TGA shows numerous modifications,
which suggests an intermediary form. It is likely, therefore, that Poe made changes in copies other than those which were ultimately
owned by Duane, and that those copies have not been located and possibly have not survived. Poe appears to have attempted to erase
his changes in the Duane copies, and it is possible that a copy exists in which these erased changes have been overlooked. This
missing text is presumably reflected in text-05.)
Text-05 — “Morella” — late 1839 — TGA
(1840) — (Mabbott text C) (Although the imprint date is 1840, this book was available by early December 1839.
Although it appeared after Text-06, it presumably represents a slightly earlier form.)
Text-06 — “Morella” — November 1839 —
Burton’s — (Mabbott text D)
Text-07 — “Morella” — 1842 — TGAPP
— (Mabbott text E) (This version is a modified form of Text-05)
Text-08 — “Morella” — June 21, 1845 —
Broadway Journal — (Mabbott text F) (For Griswold’s 1850 reprinting of this text,
see the entry below, under reprints.)
Text-09 — “Morella” — about October 1848 — one
manuscript revision in Whitman copy of Broadway Journal — (Mabbott text G) (This is Mabbott’s
copy-text for the final version)
Reprints:
“Morella” — 1850 — WORKS — Griswold
reprints Text-07 (Mabbott text H)
“Morella” — 1852 — Tales and Sketches: to which is added The Raven: A Poem,
London, George Routledge & Co.
“Morella” — 1867 — Prose Tales of Edgar Allan Poe, first series (New York: W. J.
Widdleton), pp. 469-474 (This collection is extracted from the 1850-1856 edition of Poe’s Works. It was reprinted
several times.)
“Morella” — 1874 — Works of Edgar A. Poe, edited by J. H. Ingram, vol. 1, pp.
388-393 (This collection was subsequently reprinted in various forms) (Although Ingram did not yet have the copies of the
Broadway Journal with Poe’s minor change for this story, Ingram is the first to editorially correct the spelling of
“Hinnom” in the third paragraph, which is the only change marked by Poe. Consequently, Ingram’s 1884 printing of
the tale is not included in this bibliography as it provides no new text.)
Scholarly and Noteworthy Reprints:
“Morella” — 1894-1895 — The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, vol. 1: Tales, ed. G. E.
Woodberry and E. C. Stedman, Chicago: Stone and Kimball (1:174-181)
“Morella” — 1902 — The Complete Works of Edgar
Allan Poe, vol. 2: Tales I, ed. J. A. Harrison, New York: T. Y. Crowell (2:27-34, and 2:318-323)
“Morella” — 1978 — The Collected Works of Edgar
Allan Poe, vol. 2: Tales & Sketches I, ed. T. O. Mabbott, Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
(2:221-237)
“Morella” — 1984 — Edgar Allan Poe: Poetry and Tales, ed. Patrick F. Quinn (New
York: Library of America), pp. 234-239
“Morella” — (French translation by Charles Baudelaire)
“Morella” — November 14-15, 1853 — Paris
“Morella” — Part I (November 14, 1853)
“Morella” — Part II (November 15, 1853)
“Morella” — September 18, 1854 — Le Pays
“Morella” — 1856 — Histoires extraordinaires, Paris: Michel Lévy
frères
“Morella” — 1969 — a reading by Martin Donegan as part of volume III of Short Stories
of Edgar Allan Poe, issued on the CMS Records label (CMS-567)
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Bibliography:
Dumoulié, Camille, “Des signes d‘inquiétante étrangeté,”
Nouvelle revue francaise, 1994, 493:71-79 and 494:102-110
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.
Holt, Palmer C., “Poe and H. N. Coleridge’s Greek Classic Poets: ‘Pinakidia,’
‘Politian’ and ‘Morella’ Sources, American Literature, March 1962, 34:8-30
Mabbott, Thomas Ollive, “The Source of the Title of Poe’s ‘Morella’,” Notes
& Queries, January 9, 1937, 172:26-27
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.
Neale, Walter G., “The Source of Poe’s ‘Morella’,” American Literature, May
1937, 9:237-239
Richmond, Lee J., “Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘Morella’: Vampire of Volition,” Studies
in Short Fiction, Winter 1972, 9:93-95
Sandler, S. Gerald, “Poe’s Indebtedness to Locke’s An Essay Concerning Human
Understanding,” Bucknell University Studies in English, Summer 1961, 5:107-121
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.
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[S:0 - JAS] - Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - Works - Tales - Morella