Edgar Allan Poe to William D. Ticknor — 1846-12-24

Edgar Allan Poe to William D. Ticknor — 1846-12-24 Local historical letter reading from the Poe Society’s manuscript-text page, with modern correction glosses and website material excluded. The scholarly checklist documents an early printed witness in Hervey Allen, Israfel, 1926, volume 2, page 725, as documented by the scholarly checklist. This record preserves the electronic letter text, not a scan of that printed witness or the autograph. Poe requests Oliver Wendell Holmes’s poems, biographical information and an autograph for his planned Literary America. Typography is simplified. The transcription has not been independently proofread word by word. New-York: Dec. 24, 46 Dr Sir, I am engaged on a work which I will probably call “Literary America,” and in which I propose to make a general and yet a minute survey of our Letters. I wish, of course, to speak of Oliver Wendell Holmes, and as I can say nothing of him to which you, as his publisher, could object, I venture to ask you for a copy of his Poems, and any memoranda, literary or personal, which may serve my purpose, and which you may have it in your power to supply. If you could procure me his autograph, also, I would be greatly obliged to you. You will of course understand that I should not feel justified in asking these favors, unless I thought, as all men do, very highly of Mr Holmes. Please send anything for me, to the care of Freeman Hunt Esq, Merchants’ Magazine Office, N. York. Very truly and respectfully Yours Edgar A Poe. Wm. D. Ticknor Esqr