From the Guest Editor

Poe scholars are well aware of the myriad of musical adaptations of Poe’s works set in virtually every idiom. Over twenty years ago Burton R. Pollin counted 940 musical interpretations of Poe’s work¹—certainly that number is well over that mark by now. Everyone from Rachmaninoff to Lou Reed seems drawn to explore Poe’s “mystic currents of meaning” in musical terms, perhaps in an attempt to embody the “suggestive and indefinite,” to express the inexpressible. Unfortunately, because of the technical nature of musicological studies of Poe adaptations, literary scholars are exposed to relatively little of it. However, with the dawning of the age of adaptation studies glinting along the peaks of the “ragged mountains,” more attention to Poe’s decided mark in the world of music will inevitably shine forth among us.

The occasion for this special issue was my being asked to introduce a performance of Christian Asplund’s Extracts from “The Fall of the House of Usher” at Brigham Young University in October 2012. The piece consists of musical settings for seventeen narrated excerpts from Poe’s tale. As I took in the performance, I felt that the Poe community would like to be made aware of this darkly delightful piece. It is written for nine musicians including narrator Michael Lee, a music professor from the University of Oklahoma. In the spirit of Poe’s tale, the music is strange and haunting, synthesizing a wealth of ancient and postmodern musical sources. Asplund, a professor of composition in the BYU music department, composed it in 2011 for “Love Feast,” a musical celebration of contemporary composers and performers at the University of Oklahoma under the direction of Professor Lee. My role was to introduce the performance and provide some background on “Usher” and on its musical history, particularly discussing Debussy’s experience in writing his own unfinished “Usher” opera. The Extracts can be accessed online at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5mNCs057pg.

This special issue of the Edgar Allan Poe Review includes my extensive interview with Professor Asplund in which we discuss the origin of the piece, his views on Poe, and what aspects of Poe’s tale he was trying to capture. Interestingly, the Extracts leave out all mention of Roderick and Madeline, the narrator focusing exclusively on the descriptions of the House of Usher itself and virtually everything in it, including its books, art, cellar, and other rooms. This brilliantly captures the atmosphere of the tale in a unique way, Madeline and Roderick merely ghosts drifting in the background of our imaginations.

In addition to my interview with Asplund, there are five essays on interpretations of Poe’s work. Shedding additional light on the French face of Poe in the era of Baudelaire, Bruce Weiner examines Maurice Rollinat’s adaptation of “A Dream” as well as his overlooked “Eldorado.” John Dern does a rhetorical analysis of Iron Maiden’s heavy metal adaptation of “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” taking us from Poe’s “air of method” to an “air of madness.” German musicologist Gregor Herzfeld provides an overview of the tradition of Poe adaptations in terms of the broader operatic Gothic movement. Charles Brewer looks at Alec Wilder’s two scores for Watson’s 1928 film The Fall of the House of Usher, and how they provide two distinct interpretations of the film that reflect the changing views of contemporary literary culture. Finally, Charity McAdams relates the ballad “The Mad Tryst” to Poe’s “Usher.”