Rufus Wilmot Griswold

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Rufus Wilmot Griswold (February 15, 1815 - August 12, 1857) was an American anthologist, editor and critic, famous for his enmity with Edgar Allan Poe.

Born in Benson, Vermont, he travelled extensively, worked in newspaper offices, was a Baptist clergyman for a time, and finally became a journalist in New York City, where he was successively a member of the staffs of The Brother Jonathan, The New World (1839-1840) and The New Yorker (1840). From 1841 to 1843 he edited Graham's Magazine (Philadelphia), and added to its list of contributors many leading American writers. From 1850 to 1852 he edited the International Magazine (New York), which in 1852 was merged into Harper's Magazine. He died in New York City.

He was a compiler and editor of various anthologies (with brief biographies and critiques), such as Poets and Poetry of America (1842), his most popular and valuable book; Prose Writers of America (1846); Female Poets of America (1848); and Sacred Poets of England and America (1849). Of his own writings his Republican Court: or American Society in the Days of Washington (1854) is the only one of permanent value.

He edited the first American edition of Milton's prose works (1845), and, claiming to be literary executor, edited, with James Russell Lowell and Nathaniel Parker Willis, the posthumous works (1850) of Edgar Allan Poe. This edition included a biographical "Memoir" which has become notorious for its inaccuracy. In modern days his name is usually associated with Poe's, most often as a character assassin. Griswold's great contemporary reputation as a critic has not stood the test of time; but he rendered a valuable service in making Americans better acquainted with the poetry and prose of their own countrymen.

See Passages from the Correspondence and Other Papers of Rufus W. Griswold (Cambridge, Mass., 1898), edited by his son William McCrillis Griswold (1853-1899).