Show brings vivid world of Edgar Alan Poe to life

Bradford Farwell will play the role of the master writer in a particularly desperate moment in his life.

The second show of Vashon Repertory Theatre’s fall season will transport show-goers to the obsessive world of Edgar Alan Poe.

In the one-person show, “Edgar Allan Poe, The Poet’s Journey,” written by Bryan Willis, Bradford Farwell will play the role of the master poet, critic and father of the detective novel, in a particularly passionate and desperate moment in his life

Farwell’s performance recreates an 1849 literary salon in the last months of Poe’s life, as he toured the country in an effort to woo subscribers for a new magazine of his own creation, “The Stylus.”

These speaking engagements ranged from intimate conversations to public lectures, where Poe would recite his work and share his views on the state of American literature, the philosophy of composition, and the noblest of professions, in his estimation – that of the poet.

Poe was also known for devoting entire lectures to deriding Longfellow, Emerson, and “the other incorrigibly arrogant bumpkins we find in New England.”

Poe was at once charming and destructive — and Farwell’s performance reflects Poe’s lifelong battle for recognition in a young nation, struggling to define its own history and voice.

The show will be performed at 4 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct 28, at Snapdragon’s Black Cat Cabaret.

Purchase tickets at vashoncenterforthearts.org.