Poe Studies
Cover of the most recent issue of Poe Studies
A CELJ Conversation with Kelly Ross, Editor of Poe Studies
Debra Rae Cohen: Kelly, usually where we begin is by asking you to talk a little bit about the history of the journal and then the history of your own involvement with it. So, if you could tell us a little bit about Poe Studies, we'd appreciate it.
Kelly Ross: Poe Studies was founded in 1968, so it's a fairly old academic journal. It's focused on Poe and his circle, his contemporaries, and we're especially interested in social and theoretical approaches to Poe rather than biographical approaches. It is published by Johns Hopkins University Press; it was started at Washington State University, but it shifted to JHUP several years ago. This is my second year as editor. I was coeditor with Emron Esplin for a year as he mentored me and showed me the ropes, and then I took over two years ago. Emron was editor for six years. And before him Jana Argersinger was the longtime editor, and I think a lot of people are familiar with her work, because she did such a fabulous job.
DRC: Is the journal linked to a society? How did you come to be editor?
KR: There is a Poe journal linked to the Poe Studies Association, but that's not us. That one is called Edgar Allan Poe Review. I became editor of Poe Studies because Emron was ready to step down, and they were looking for a person to replace him. I think one of the things he and the rest of the editorial board, especially the consulting editors, wanted in the next editor was a person whose scholarship focuses on Poe and race and Poe and gender, which is what I work on, especially Poe and race. I think that was a conscious choice on the part of the editorial board, that they really wanted to make sure that Poe Studies is keeping up with important scholarly trends and subjects, and doesn't get mired in old-fashioned approaches. So I think that was why I was chosen.
Eugenia Zuroski: We’re always really interested in the way that the editorial work of a journal is actually organized and resourced, because at CELJ we're learning so much about the variations of models across scholarly journals. And we're also interested in whether these systems or structures have changed in any significant ways over time. So, can you talk a little bit about who's involved, who does what, who provides the resources for what? And whether these things are in flux or pretty established and long-standing?
KR: Sure, I'm really interested in this too. That's why I really love CELJ, because you find out that everything works differently at different places. Poe Studies has just one editor, which is me. We have three consulting editors, Jana Argersinger, Alexander Hammond, and Scott Peeples, all three of whom have been editors in the past and have stayed on to be consulting editors. And then we have a special section called Newly Translated Poe Scholarship, and Emron has agreed to stay on and be the section editor for that. I think that's a really cool feature that we have, though I don't know if it's unique to us. Basically, Emron works with scholars in other countries, and lines up translators to translate Poe scholarship that's been originally published in another language, and then we publish it in English. So, in the upcoming journal that'll be out in October, we have a Japanese scholar’s work, and an Ecuadorian scholar’s work. It's such an amazing thing to be able to bring this international scholarship to an English-speaking audience. Emron is a comparative literature person, so he is able to do that work, and I wouldn't be able to, so I'm really grateful to him for staying on and continuing that that work.
DRC: I'm fascinated by the idea of this section. Are the translations done as scholarship—as part of the great mass of unpaid labor of scholarship—or do you budget for translators who you pay?
KR: No, there's no payment. It's unpaid labor, and it's mainly people that Emron has relationships with. So, for example, he's at BYU, and his dean is a Japanese scholar, and so his dean has been one of the people that translates the Japanese scholarship. And then he’s also working with grad students. So, I guess it's good for grad students because they're getting that translation practice. But as we all know, editorial work is not counted or valued as much as individual scholarship. It's really just people being really generous with their time and agreeing to do it. But really, I think it is providing such an amazing service to English-speaking scholars, to have access to these ideas.
DRC: Could you tell us the frequency of the journal?
KR: It comes out once a year, in October.
DRC: I think that most of us who are used to journals that have a much higher spin rate are kind of jealous of the way that process operates at a yearly journal. Can you talk about how the planning for it works? How far in advance do you know what's going to be in it? Are you reliant on over the transom submissions? Are you planning ahead for thematic sections or issues?
KR: I have had special features in the first two volumes that I've edited. For those in particular, we're planning really far ahead. I work with a guest editor for those. The first one that I did was on Poe and science, and Emron had already set that up before I came; I was co-editor when we were doing that, so I was learning the process. But the one that's coming out this year, on the poetics of reception, I saw that through from start to finish, working with the guest editor, Elissa Zellinger. We started working on that two years ago, to invite people and get everything through the peer review process. And it took a long time. Right now, I'm working on one with Scott Peeples as the guest editor, and that's on Poe and streaming television. And so that'll be out in 2026, and we started on that in November or December of last year.
DRC: Is that going to treat the Fall of the House of Usher series?
KR: Yeah, exactly, that's what spurred the whole thing. I guess we started working on it before, we had a panel at MLA on Poe and streaming, and that built into the submissions. But with The Fall of the House of Usher, it felt like it was the right time for that special feature. So those special features take about two years from the very beginning of the planning process to finish. And then, in addition to those, we also publish over the transom articles. I try to make sure that the special features are short enough that we still have room for at least two regular articles.
EZ: We always like to ask this: if a reader were to come to your journal for the very first time, are there particular issues that you might direct them to, to give them a sense of what the journal is, or what it's been, or that you're just particularly proud of?
KR: I would direct them to Volume 56, 2023. That one is the whole volume, “African American Writers Respond to Poe.” I came in at the very end of that process and helped to copy edit, but Emron and the guest editors, John Gruesser and Norlisha Crawford, put it all together. And I think it's such an incredible issue. It was needed for so long to bring Poe scholarship up to date on Poe and race, and it's an amazing volume. I would definitely say to start there. I don't think that issue necessarily reflects what the journal has been because it is so groundbreaking, but I do think it reflects the rigor of the journal and the commitment to theoretical approaches.
DRC: And for you, before you took on this editorship, were there particular articles in the journal that stood out to you, that that you see as particularly sort of epical or groundbreaking, that that that that made you want to edit this journal?
KR: Oh, I love that question. Teresa Goddu wrote an article, “Rethinking Race and Slavery in Poe Studies.” I love her article. It's about race in Poe. There was a book that came out by Terence Whalen that said Poe was an average racist, the same as all white people in the time period. And Teresa Goddu really challenged that idea in such a productive way. That article was so important to me when I was writing my dissertation, and I'm just so proud that that came out in Poe Studies. Whenever people are writing about race in the 19th century, especially with white authors, I think they do tend to kind of give them a little bit of a pass, like, that was what it was like to be white then. And I always ask them to read that article, because I think it's so smart in the way that it pushes past that sort of presumption.
DRC: You know, it's interesting. We haven't done one of these about what is, I guess, still called a single-author journal before. And it really does raise such different questions, right? I realize that you're dealing with this in terms of the nitty gritty all of the time, but could you talk a little bit about how a single-author journal has to think of itself differently in the present moment compared to when the journal was founded?
KR: That’s such a great question. And I think with Poe Studies, it's even more complicated, because we're not the only single-author journal on Poe—we have a, I wouldn't say competitor, because I think they're a great journal, and I really like the editor, Travis Montgomery, but there are two journals that focus on Poe. And as you know, no one is going to grad school to write a monograph on Poe anymore, no responsible dissertation advisor would allow that. I think what our journal has tried to do is really emphasize that it's not that we want to be about Poe and his life, that we're not celebrating Poe in this journal. But Poe being such a lightning rod figure and being in the midst of so many crucial debates for the 19th century, I do think that, in a way, he is a node that allows us to access so many of the conversations that are most important right now. There is a sense in which Poe is just a central point and not really the important figure anymore. It's more, what does Poe allow us to access? That's my approach to the journal.
On the other hand, I see when I teach a seminar that students take it because of Poe. So maybe there is a way in which we can use Poe to draw people in, even if we end up not wanting to put him on a pedestal, in the way that perhaps author-focused journals would have in the past. It's still an interesting selling point for a group of people that might not be interested otherwise.
DRC: Poe as the gateway drug.
EZ: I want to follow up on this question about how a single-author journal presents itself in the way that you're talking about. Because I'm thinking, then, about how the journal finds different readerships and also potential new pools of submitting authors. It’s like the kind of work that you're doing with your students in these seminars where they’re, like, “oh, I didn't know that taking this Poe seminar was going to lead to this.” Are there any ways in which you as an editor are thinking about how to put your journal on the radar of the kinds of readers and scholars that you know could and should be part of the community, and if so, what does that look like? Or what do you wish that looked like?
KR: Yeah, that is such an important question, and something I'm thinking about all the time. I took the editor role because I wanted to bring in people who wouldn't normally consider publishing in Poe Studies. C19 is the main scholarly organization for my area of study, and right after I became editor, they had a seminar at the conference about editorship, and I applied to that with exactly the question that you just articulated so beautifully. And I said this is what I want to think about and how can I approach this? And it was great because I was in that seminar with all these editors, and we just discussed and brainstormed that very question. And one of the things that we came up with was that it's important to reach out to people who may not be working on the specific author figure, but are doing work that you think is really valuable, and you can see a connection to the author figure that they may not have considered yet. You make clear that you would love to have their work in your journal, and here's an idea that you had for a connection, or here's how their work might connect, and invite them to submit. People who maybe would never have considered Poe but whose work you think is doing something really special and valuable. I've been doing that, reaching out to individual people whose work I admire, people whose papers I see, and just letting them know that I see a connection.
The special features, I think, represent another way of doing it, because instead of just waiting for people to submit, I'm proactively creating a framework for them to work within that can pull in more people who are writing about topics that need to be addressed to fill gaps in the scholarship that I've recognized. And then, the Poe Studies Association just had its biennial conference this year and I worked really hard there to make sure I talked to the people whose presentations seemed like they were doing something that is missing from the scholarship, saying to them, we really need your voice and please consider submitting. It’s a lot of outreach, and it's a lot of building bridges to people. And that's also why that volume that I mentioned, “African American Writers Respond to Poe” is so important to me, because when I approach people and I say, you know, I could see your work fitting into Poe Studies, the work you're doing is valuable and important, and they say, “I would never, I'm 0% interested in that,” I can show them that volume and say, “but look at this as a model. Look at this incredible work these people have done.” And I do think it opens people's minds to the possibility.
DRC: Do you have plans for similarly ambitious special issues in the future?
KR: I think the one that's coming out in October is similar in the sense that it's doing for Poe and gender what that one did for Poe and race. It’s about the poetics of reception, but it's really about rethinking Poe's relationships with women and women's relationships with Poe, both critical and creative. And so I think it's going to update the field in a lot of really important ways. For example, we have an author in that special feature who's writing about a trans studies approach to Poe; I think that's going to break a lot of ground and perhaps make people interested who wouldn't have been interested before. So that kind of work, I think, is really important not only to fill gaps in scholarship, but also to create a sense of possibility that authors might be interested in exploring.
EZ: We tend to try to end the conversation with questions about visions for the future, and you've already given us a lot of that, but I'll ask a version of it anyway, thinking about you having just really come on board. It sounds like there is a long history at this journal of people serving as editor and then continuing to serve as a kind of consulting editor. I really love this, and I hadn't heard this model before, where there's this community that is being built through the inheritance of the seat of editor. Are there any particular things that you want to do with your time in this position that you haven't already talked about? And where would you like to see the journal go in the future?
KR: Yeah, I agree. I love the model of the consulting editorship, and I'm really grateful to them for their support. And then we do have also an editorial board that’s really wonderful as well, and as you all know, they give their time and their service. And I couldn't do without them. But where would I like to see it go? I think, well, one of the things that I have enjoyed the most about being an editor is the mentorship. Because I teach at a small undergraduate school, I don't have grad students, working with some of the contributors, especially people who are submitting over the transom, working with grad students for whom it's their first publication, has been incredibly rewarding. And so I would like to continue doing that. The special features, I think, because of their nature, we're usually working with people more advanced in the field, experts in the area. But I want to make sure that there's still a place for first-time authors to publish in Poe Studies, because their work is cutting edge, and it's just incredibly rewarding to see their ideas develop. So maybe my plan for the future is to figure out how to balance those things and make sure that we have plenty of room for that aspect of the journal as well as the special features aspect.
Also, Jana did a volume in 2000 about “New Directions in Poe Studies.” And it reassessed the field at that moment, with all these articles on Poe and queer studies, Poe and gender; and Teresa Goddu’s article was part of that, on Poe and race. So it was the state of the field, but in an amazing way that was looking forward and looking at all these conversations that were going to be so important in the next decades. So I would love to do that at some point, as a special feature or volume, and look ahead into the next twenty years.
EZ: I remember in grad school, the feeling of reading issues like those as some of the first moments where I felt like the people doing this work right now were trying make space for people like me. And so, yeah, I think that that would be a brilliant thing for you to do in your time as editor.
Kelly Ross
Poe Studies co-editor