On Displaying Edgar Allan Poe

This past week marked the 166^th anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe’s death, which was October 7, 1849. I happen to be a big fan of Poe and generally get the urge to read him as the days grow shorter and the weather grows colder.

Fortunately, my co-worker likes Poe just as much as do and over the past five years we’ve done three Poe’s Parlor displays (yes, we’re that fond of it and I am perfectly willing to claim it as my favorite) each time adding a few more things referencing the works of this master writer. While we’re not doing one this year, I see no reason not to revisit those we have done.

The first year we had some beautiful blue paper for the background. At this point we only had a small number of things referencing his stories and poems.

Excuse the glare, these cases are right next to the door and difficult to photograph.

Then came the second time, in which no perfect parlor paper could be found and we went dark. 

A few shadows joined Poe's parlor.

As you can see this background has some eyeballs peering out, not ideal for a sophisticated parlor, but it was relatable to one of my favorite of Poe’s stories “The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether”.

The raven isn't the only one watching...

Last year deciding the eyeballs to be unacceptable, I managed to patch over some with some of the remaining background and the framed picture conveniently covered one of the upper ones.

There are about 11 or 12 references to Poe’s works in this last display (including the afore mentioned “Tarr and Fether” eyes-you just can't them since they're on the side). How many can you name?

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