The Devil in the Belfry

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"The Devil in the Belfry"
Author	Edgar Allan Poe
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre(s)	Satirical short story
Published in	Saturday Chronicle and Mirror of the Times
Media type	Print (newspaper)
Publication date	1839

"The Devil in the Belfry" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe. It was first published in 1839.

It is a satirical short story, making fun of the United States President Martin Van Buren and his election methods, by ridiculing the inhabitants of Vondervotteimittis, with their strong Dutch features. This methodical, boring and quiet little borough is devastated by the arrival of a devilish figure playing a big fiddle who comes straight down from a hill, goes into the belltower and eventually kills the belfry-man.

1 Analysis
2 Illustrations
3 Publication history
4 Adaptations
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Analysis

It can be looked upon as a satire of New York City (originally settled by the Dutch) which has now been "invaded" by the "Devil" (i.e., the Irish): the "Devil" plays on his fiddle an out-of-tune song called "Judy O'Flannagan and Paddy O'Rafferty" - stock character names for Irish Immigrants.^{[citation needed]}

Critics often compare the tale to another New York satire, "A History of New-York" written by Washington Irving under the pseudonym "Diedrich Knickerbocker."

[edit] Illustrations

There are many famous illustrations for this short tale. Just to name two, one is by the Italian engraver Alberto Martini, which is very accurate in describing the final moment and the other is by the Belgian artist James Ensor, that illustrates the moment when the stranger arrives in town.

[edit] Publication history

The story was first published in the May 18, 1839 issue of Philadelphia's Saturday Chronicle and Mirror of the Times.

[edit] Adaptations

Between 1908 and 1914, French composer Claude Debussy worked on two one-act operas, one based on The Devil in the Belfry and the other based on "The Fall of the House of Usher". However, only 30 minutes of Usher were completed before Debussy's death. For his adaptation of "The Devil in the Belfry," he said he wanted to create "a happy blending of the real and the fantastic." His version of the devil, he said, would "put an end to the idea that the devil is the spirit of evil. He is simply the spirit of contradiction." The character of the devil was not intended to speak or sing, only whistle.^[1]

[edit] References

^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. Checkmark Books, 2001. p. 68

[edit] External links

Link to The Devil in the Belfry as it appeared in Collected Tales of E. A. Poe (1850)

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

The Devil in the Belfry

v • d • e

Works of Edgar Allan Poe

Poems

Poetry (1824) • O, Tempora! O, Mores! (1825) • Song (1827) • Imitation (1827) • Spirits of the Dead (1827) • A Dream (1827) • Stanzas (1827) • Tamerlane (1827) • The Lake (1827) • Evening Star (1827) • A Dream (1827) • To Margaret (1827) • The Happiest Day (1827) • To The River —— (1828) • Romance (1829) • Fairy-Land (1829) • To Science (1829) • To Isaac Lea (1829) • Al Aaraaf (1829) • An Acrostic (1829) • Elizabeth (1829) • To Helen (1831) • A Paean (1831) • The Sleeper (1831) • The City in the Sea (1831) • The Valley of Unrest (1831) • Israfel (1831) • The Coliseum (1833) • Enigma (1833) • Fanny (1833) • Serenade (1833) • Latin Hymn (1833) • To One in Paradise (1833) • Hymn (1835) • Politician (1835) • May Queen Ode (1836) • Spiritual Song (1836) • Bridal Ballad (1837) • To Zante (1837) • The Haunted Palace (1839) • Silence, a Sonnet (1839) • Lines on Joe Locke (1843) • The Conqueror Worm (1843) • Lenore (1843) • Eulalie (1843) • A Campaign Song (1844) • Dream-Land (1844) • Impromptu. To Kate Carol (1845) • To Frances (1845) • The Divine Right of Kings (1845) • Epigram for Wall Street (1845) • The Raven (1845) • A Valentine (1846) • Beloved Physician (1847) • An Enigma (1847) • Deep in Earth (1847) • Ulalume (1847) • Lines on Ale (1848) • To Marie Louise (1848) • Evangeline (1848) • A Dream Within a Dream (1849) • Eldorado (1849) • For Annie (1849) • The Bells (1849) • Annabel Lee (1849) • Alone (1875)

Tales

Metzengerstein (1832) • The Duc De L'Omelette (1832) • A Tale of Jerusalem (1832) • Loss of Breath (1832) • Bon-Bon (1832) • MS. Found in a Bottle (1833) • The Assignation (1834) • Berenice (1835) • Morella (1835) • Lionizing (1835) • The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall (1835) • King Pest (1835) • Shadow - A Parable (1835) • Four Beasts in One - The Homo-Cameleopard (1836) • Mystification (1837) • Silence - A Fable (1837) • Ligeia (1838) • How to Write a Blackwood Article (1838) • A Predicament (1838) • The Devil in the Belfry (1839) • The Man That Was Used Up (1839) • The Fall of the House of Usher (1839) • William Wilson (1839) • The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion (1839) • Why the Little Frenchman Wears His Hand in a Sling (1840) • The Business Man (1840) • The Man of the Crowd (1840) • The Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841) • A Descent into the Maelström (1841) • The Island of the Fay (1841) • The Colloquy of Monos and Una (1841) • Never Bet the Devil Your Head (1841) • Eleonora (1841) • Three Sundays in a Week (1841) • The Oval Portrait (1842) • The Masque of the Red Death (1842) • The Landscape Garden (1842) • The Mystery of Marie Roget (1842) • The Pit and the Pendulum (1842) • The Tell-Tale Heart (1843) • The Gold-Bug (1843) • The Black Cat (1843) • Diddling (1843) • The Spectacles (1844) • A Tale of the Ragged Mountains (1844) • The Premature Burial (1844) • Mesmeric Revelation (1844) • The Oblong Box (1844) • The Angel of the Odd (1844) • Thou Art the Man (1844) • The Literary Life of Thingum Bob, Esq. (1844) • The Purloined Letter (1844) • The Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade (1845) • Some Words with a Mummy (1845) • The Power of Words (1845) • The Imp of the Perverse (1845) • The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether (1845) • The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar (1845) • The Sphinx (1846) • The Cask of Amontillado (1846) • The Domain of Arnheim (1847) • Mellonta Tauta (1849) • Hop-Frog (1849) • Von Kempelen and His Discovery (1849) • X-ing a Paragrab (1849) • Landor's Cottage (1849)

Other works

Essays: Maelzel's Chess Player (1836) • The Daguerreotype (1840) • The Philosophy of Furniture (1840) • A Few Words on Secret Writing (1841) • The Rationale of Verse (1843) • Morning on the Wissahiccon (1844) • Old English Poetry (1845) • The Philosophy of Composition (1846) • The Poetic Principle (1846) • Eureka: A Prose Poem (1848) Hoax: The Balloon-Hoax (1844)

Novels: The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket (1837) • The Journal of Julius Rodman (1840) Play: Politian (1835)

Other: The Conchologist's First Book (1839) • The Light-House (1849)