The year is 1849, and Edgar Allan Poe has just been buried. Shortly after a critic rants about his work, lo and behold, the poet’s ghost rises from the grave.
He is soon joined by Beauty incarnate, who tells him he has this one night to reunite with the most important women from his life. If Poe can choose a soul mate from among the ghosts, the two will spend eternity in peace. But fail to do so, and his death will be a lonely, And I Must Scream -scenario. No pressure.
Taking place entirely in one set (a graveyard) this dialogue-heavy play explores the poet’s life through the eyes of his love interests; both the famous and forgotten.
This play provides examples of:
- All Love Is Unrequited
- And I Must Scream: According to Beauty, this is what death is like if you don’t have a soul mate to share it with.
- Anthropomorphic Personification: Beauty.
- Downer Beginning: The play opens with Poe’s death, and his life’s work getting panned by critics.
- It Will Never Catch On: The critic who gives Poe’s obituary believes this.
- Protectorate: Virginia claims she was this to Poe; she felt he only married her to protect her.
- Third-Person Person: Virginia.
- Title Drop: Poe compares his dilemma to looking at one object through seven spyglasses. Or, as he puts it, the Spyglass Seven.
- You Have Waited Long Enough: Sarah was engaged to Poe, but when he left for school, she was eventually pressured by her parents to marry elsewhere.
