Edgar Allan Poe’s Feud With Boston? Nevermore

Edgar Allan Poe had a love-hate relationship with the city of Boston.

He was born here in 1809 and published some of his most famous works here. But he considered Boston writers self-important and preachy, and he said so. And Boston returned the sentiment. Ralph Waldo Emerson dismissed Poe as a “jingle man” for his simplistic style, as if the author of “The Raven” were writing television ads for toothpaste.

Not surprisingly, little trace of Poe remains in this region’s august annals of literary achievement, overstuffed as they are with the likes of Emerson and Thoreau, Longfellow and Hawthorne.

But Poe’s snarly past with Boston will be set aside on Sunday, when the city officially welcomes the master of the macabre into its fold with the unveiling of a statue in his honor.