HOURS OF LIFE AND OTHER POEMS, by SARAH HELEN WHITMAN.

PROVIDENCE: George H. Whitney, 1853. First edition.

SIGNED by SARAH HELEN WHITMAN, b.1803 d.1878, and by her sister SUSAN ANNA POWER [S. A. Power], b.1813 d.1877, both at the top of the title page. Susan Anna Power was mentally ill and at the time was under the complete care of her widowed sister, Sarah. The book also has some small pencil hand corrections, additions, and margin marks, apparently in the hand of Sarah Helen Whitman.

The corrections and additions are: (1) page 34 - "Hell" is lined out and "Hades" is written in both the right and left margin; (2) page 37 - "norland" has its "n" underlined and the word "Norland" [capital N] is written in the right margin; (3) page 95 - page 95 is misnumbered "59", there is a line beside the number marking the mistake for correction; (4) page 175 - the first line of the second stanza has "his rich" lined out and "the Pilgrim's" written above the lined out words - the sentence read "Listen to his rich words, intoned' and is being changed to "Listen to the Pilgrim's words, intoned"; (5) page 176 - the "y" at the end of "dusky" is lined out and there is a mark next to the line pointing out the change. The margin marks are lines or other pencil marks next to a line or stanza, likely noting that something Whitman was considering altering. They are found on pages 69, 95 (misnumbered page 59), 136, 148, 175, and 190.

Hardcovers, blue cloth covered boards, gilt designs on the covers and spine, and blind embossed framing designs on the covers, gilt page edges, 4.5x6.5 inches, vii, 227 pages.

VERY GOOD condition, Spine professionally restored and inner hinges professionally reinforced making this a solid, tight, lovely copy; the covers are clean, bright and attractive, the gilt page edges have some scratches but still glimmer; internally, there is foxing on a few pages here and there, shorelining to the bottom corner area of the latter pages (text fully legible), and light toning to the very edge of the pages; overall tight, bright, clean and clear. One of the nicest copies I have seen.

About SARAH HELEN WHITMAN (from Wikipedia and the Poetry Foundation website):

******Sarah Helen Power Whitman, b.1803 d.1878, was an American poet, transcendentalist, spiritualist and the great romantic interest of Edgar Allan Poe. Whitman had a penchant for wearing black and a coffin-shaped charm around her neck, and held séances in her home.

Whitman and Edgar Allan Poe first crossed paths in Providence in July 1845. However nothing came of that rose garden meeting until three years later, in 1848, when they began exchanging letters and poetry. Poe asked for and Helen agreed to an "immediate marriage". Poe vowed to remain sober during their engagement - a vow he violated frequently - and Sarah finally called the wedding off.

Edgar Allan Poe attempted to commit suicide with an overdose of laudanum in Providence, Rhode Island, in November 1848, shortly after Sarah Helen Whitman refused the wedding.

Whitman's poetry collection HOURS OF LIFE, AND OTHER POEMS was published in 1853. Some of the poems in this collection were reportedly helped along by her sister Susan, who had some poetic skills of her own.******

You can read much more about Sarah Helen Whitman on the POETRY FOUNDATION and EDGAR ALLAN POE RI websites.

You can also read all about her mentally ill and madly eccentric sister, SUSAN ANNA POWER, on the Edgar Allan Poe RI website. The sisters lived alone together for many years after their mother died. Susan Anna Power almost never left the house.