Send us a Text Message. This the final episode of a series that looks at what might have happened if Edgar Allan Poe had chosen a different path - if he had decided to become a soldier after his time at West Point, and not one of the greatest of all American writers. And we invariably go off to discuss other subjects as well including the creative …

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - my name is George Bartley, and this is episode 257 - Waking at 6 AM This and the following podcast episodes are an alternate or what if history exercises. The episodes look at what might have happened if Edgar Allan Poe had chosen a different path - if he had decided to become a soldier after his t…

Send us a Text Message. This and the following podcast episodes in this series are an alternate or what if history exercises. The episodes look at what might have happened if Edgar Allan Poe had chosen a different path - if he had decided to become a soldier after his time at West Point, and not one of the greatest of all American writers. And we i…

Send us a Text Message. This and the following three podcast episodes were begun as what if history exercises. These episodes look at what might have happened if Edgar Allan Poe had chosen a different path - if he had decided to become a soldier after his time at West Point, and not one of the greatest of all American writers. And we invariably go …

Send us a Text Message. Welcome back to Celebrate Poe - This is episode 254 - Poe’s Views on Democracy. Today I would like to talk with Mr. Poe about his views of government - and especially about what he might have thought about the specter of Donald Trump. I had previously been under the impression that Edgar Allan Poe was somewhat reactionary in…

Send us a Text Message. This podcast episode deals with an address given by Robert G. Ingersoll - one of the individuals who spoke at Whitman’s funeral. He was the poet of Love. He was not ashamed of that divine passion that has built every home; that divine passion that has painted every picture and given us every real work of art; that divine pas…

Send us a Text Message. The main title of this episode, Call Me By Your Name, is taken from the text of a letter written to Whitman by one of Whitman’s admirers - none other than Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula. Trickle drops! my blue veins leaving! O drops of me! trickle, slow drops, Candid from me falling, drip, bleeding drops, From wounds mad…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - Episode 251 - When Whitman Met Peter - this episode deals with an essential area of Walt Whitman’s life and creative spirit - in fact, you might even say that a twenty-something immigrant served as an inspiration and a muse for some of the poet’s greatest works. Of course, during Pride Month, this …

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - This is episode 250 Whitman and the Civil War. Walt Whitman was forty-two years old when the Civil War started. Some critics would charge that he should have joined the Union Army, but anyone who knew him, like his friend and biographer John Burroughs, could hardly conceive of the mild and empathic…

Send us a Text Message. This is episode 249 - America’s First Gay Bar While the word gay certainly wasn’t used to connote same sex attraction during Walt Whitman’s lifetime, Whitman DID patronize an establishment at 647 Broadway that today might be considered a gay bar. And that drinking establishment was known as Pfaff’s - spelled PFAFFs. I have e…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - This is episode 248 - America’s Poet - This is the first full episode of Pride Month dealing with Walt Whitman. This episode emphasizes that Whitman continually revised and added new poems to his masterpiece "Leaves of Grass" over his lifetime to symbolize the organic, ever-changing nature of the w…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - My name is George Bartley, and this is Episode 247 - Same Sex Attraction in the 19th Century As I write the script for this podcast episode, tomorrow is the first day of LGBTQ month - and similar to previous years, I decided to devote the entire month to individuals who are viewed as gay heroes. Th…

Send us a Text Message. Today I’d like to take a slight change of pace with a look at an area that is not often associated with Edgar Allan Poe, but an area in which the Allan family vacationed - White Sulphur Springs during the summers of 1812, 1813, and 1814. Prior to the Civil War, the White Sulphur Springs area was called western Virginia, but …

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - My name is George Bartley, and this is Episode 245 - Byron’s Influences on Poe. This episode is the third - and final - for now - episode about Lord Byron, and does not deal as much with Byron’s escapades in Europe, but how he influenced Edgar Poe. The episode delves into the young Edgar Poe as an …

Send us a Text Message. This is Episode 244 of Celebrate Poe - Darkness - the second of three episodes about Lord Byron Where we left off, it is said that Lord Byron awoke one morning and found himself famous. The first run of his latest book of 500 copies sold out in three days. Pretty impressive for the time! This episode also takes a deep dive i…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe, Episode 243 ˜- Dangerous to Know. This My name is George Bartley, and this is the first of three episodes about Lord George Byron. A few episodes ago, I talked about the love of Lord Byron and his dog - and hoped I got across the point that Lord Byron was a fascinating person. Then it struck me - it…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - My name is George Bartley, and this is episode 242 - Dreamland, Continued . Hopefully this should be the last episode regarding Edgar Allan Poe’s Dream Poems - at least for now. And, hopefully, by the end of this episode, you will have an firm understanding of what Ultima Thule means.…

Send us a Text Message. This podcast to takes a deeper dive into some of Poe’s so-called Dream Works - or your works that dealt with the experience of dreaming. This episode will revisit A Dream With a Dream (perhaps the work most associated with the movie Inception.). But the majority of the episode will introduce the concept of Ultima Thule, as w…

Send us a Text Message. This episode deals with the use of animal metaphors in Poe’s works - concentrating on The Conqueror Worm and perhaps the most well-known of all poetic metaphors - The Raven. And imagine that (instead or a raven) Poe used an owl - or a parrot. What differences might that change in metaphors make?…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - My name is George Bartley, and this is episode 239. This episode deals with arguably the two greatest writers of the 19th century - Mark Twain and Edgar Poe - and their fascination with (and love of) cats in their lives and literature.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - My name is George Bartley, and this is episode 238 - Remains of a Friend. Now I admit that examining Poe’s life - while certainly interesting and informative - can be a bit tedious at times. For a complete change of pace, I thought I would look at the pets of several famous writers for the next an …

Send us a Text Message. This episode looks at how Edgar Poe was directly influenced by the works of William Shakespeare. This episode deals with a list of quotes from Shakespeare in Poe’s handwriting that can be seen at the Poe Museum in Richmond (when the author of this podcast saw that list, he became as excited as a young girl at a Taylor Swift …

Send us a Text Message. Episode 236 - A Star is Born is the first of two episodes that deal with the influence of William Shakespeare (the anniversary of his birthday was earlier this week.). The first episode deals with the influence of Shakespeare's plays (and acting in general) on the marriage of David and Eliza Poe. Using some original informat…

Send us a Text Message. This episode continues a series that compare’s elements of Christopher Nolan’s Inception with Poe’s dream works. The episode ends with Poe’s poem Dreams - a classic work that weaves a narrative transitioning from a sense of hope in dreams to a realization of their illusory nature. The speaker reminisces about reveling in dre…

Send us a Text Message. Welcome to Celebrate Poe - episode 234 - Spinning Tops, Part Two In this episode, Celebrate Poe continues its examination of some of Poe’s works against the background of Christopher Nolan’s movie - Inception. First, it is important to remember that many of Poe's tales are narrated by characters with questionable sanity or m…

Send us a Text Message. Spinning Top, Part One is a the first of five episodes devoted to an examination of Poe's "Dream Works" and Christopher Nolan's movie "Inception." This episode emphasizes that Poe's characters are often haunted by memories and past traumas, while Inception reflects this with Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) grappling with his deceas…

Send us a Text Message. This episode takes a deep dive into the three dreams of Richard III - from a dream about falling off a ship to the admonitions of "Despair and Die" before the Battle of Bosworth in The Tragedy of Richard III.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. This episode delves into (for the most part) some of the some shorter passages from Shakespeare dealing with dreams passages that are also among the most well known. Sections vary from Julius Caesar to Henry IV, Part 1 to Romeo and Juliet to Hamlet to The Tempest, among others.…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 230. To Be or Not Episode 230 continues an examination of Chronos time and Kairos times through an examination of Hamlet’s “to be or not to be” soliloquy from Shakespearae’s Hamlet. Special attention is paid to Hamlet’s decision NOT to act - that waiting for Kairos - or the right moment to make a decision - is a deci…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 229 of Celebrate Poe is a continuation of an examination of the concepts or Chronos and Kairos - this time centered around the story of Easter - for example - how concept of kairos time is intricately related to the narrative of Jesus on the Road to Emmaus. The use of kairos time in the Easter Story emphasizes that J…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 228 of Celebrate Poe is entitled “What Is a Day?” The podcast (and several episodes after it) were influenced by a sermon given by the Rev. Julia Wentworth at Trinity Episcopal Church in Indianapolis earlier this year. This episode deals with Chronos and Kairos time, and delves into the role of time in the Creation s…

Send us a Text Message. This episode deals with J. Robert Oppenheimer - the complex figure who is the subject of this year’s Best Picture. This episode compares the figures of J. Robert Oppenheimer and Edgar Allan Poe. Obviously, from different centuries, the two figures share many common complexities because of their backgrounds, talents, accompli…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 226 is the second part of a look at some of the high points of Celebrate Poe so far - from the Allans in England to Poe’s days at the University of Virginia, and at West Point. The episode takes a look at some secondary accounts of incidents of the time in the context of Poe’s life and career.…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 225 - Poe Review, 1 is a brief look (through a conversation with the ghost of Mr. Poe and George) regarding the 1st half of Mr. Poe’s life - his earliest years up to Stoke Newington. Originally, I called this episode Catchup!, but I later decided that a better title might be Poe Review, 1. The idea is for this podcas…

Send us a Text Message. In this episode, I talk about how I met the co-host of this podcast - the imaginary ghost of Edgar Allan Poe. Ok - I know it sounds strange - I still scarcely believe it myself - that this is the episode where Mr. Poe made his podcasting debut. You could say this "sets the stage" for the rest of "Celebrate Poe" and the detai…

Send us a Text Message. This is the final episode of a three part series dealing with Harriet Tubman. This episode begins with Tubman working for the Union forces, tending to newly liberated people, scouting into Confederate territory, and nursing wounded soldiers in Virginia. This episode ends with a comparison of the achievements of Tubman and Fr…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 222 is the second of a three part series dealing with Harriet Tubman, and her work with the Underground Railway. The episode deals with some of the brave efforts towards liberation that Tubman led, and ends with this description of the assault on Fort Wagner: And then we saw the lightning, and that was the guns; and …

Send us a Text Message. Episode 221 is the first of a three part series for Black History Month dealing with Harriett Tubman - some of her ideas, philosophy, and earlier years.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. Episode 220 deals with sections of an especially eloquent oration given by Frederick Douglas in honor of Abraham Lincoln.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. Episode 219 deals with Frederick Douglas after his escape to the North, and his colorful and influential life as an abolitionist speaker and advocate. While he gave thousands of speeches supporting freedom for all races, perhaps one of his most famous is What to the Slave is the Fourth of July: "My subject, then, fellow-citi…

Send us a Text Message. This episode is the first of a three part series about the great Frederick Douglass. This episode deals with the early life of Douglass - how he was kept from his mother, the moments he first realized the importance of education, and some examples of his eloquence.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. Episode 217 takes a brief look at 4 of Poe’s works where many critics believe his complex perceptions of racial issues are explored - The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Adventures of Arthur Gordon Pym, The Goldbug, and Eureka.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. This episode deals with some of the complexities of manumission in 19th century United States. The main thrust of this episode is the time that Edgar Allan Poe actually sold a slave, Edwin, for his Aunt Maria Clemm using the process of manumission - not as beneficial as it might have seemed at first.…

Send us a Text Message. This episode is the third and final episode of an "interview" between George and AI Poe (via Google Bard) regarding his first published work,, his life with and love for Virginia Clemm, some of his other loves, and Edgar Poe as a macabre maestro. An aside here - this certainly wasn’t planned - but the third episode dealing w…

Send us a Text Message. This podcast is the second part of three episodes - AI Poe talks in detail about his family, John and Francis Allan, Rosalie, and some of his works in a very moving account.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. This podcast episode is the first part of an interview with the imaginary ghost of Edgar Allan Poe based on historical records - who is a running character throughout the podcast - using examples from his life and creative observations on the ghost’s part about what life and literature was like in the 19th century. Today I w…

Send us a Text Message. Resources for Practicing Drinkers: Self-Assessment and Support: • National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA): https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/ ◦ Provides information on alcohol use disorders, interactive tools to assess drinking patterns, and links to treatment resources. • Alcoholics Anonymous (AA): https://www.aa…

Send us a Text Message. Becoming Poe Again is basically a recap of most of Episode One of this podcast series - my background regarding Poe and how I became interested in the writer. One dynamic that seems to run through my interest is the factor of just "dumb luck," and a fascination with Poe that has resulted in over 200 podcast episodes regardin…

Send us a Text Message. Episode 209 is a wide-ranging conversation with "AI Poe" regarding athletics, dualism, Poe's role in the Allan family, and Shakespeare.By George Bartley

Send us a Text Message. Episode 208 (Instrument of Death) is the second part of the story Each Man Kills by Victoria Glad - the story develops until the characters are unquestionably involved in the “world of the undead”By George Bartley