Way back in this project, specifically the 37th story, I wrote about ‘The Landscape Garden‘ a short ‘sketch’ story which was first published in the September 1842 issue of Snowden’s Ladies Companion. It was far from the most interesting piece Poe ever wrote, and it would not be unreasonable to suspect it was written purely for the pay check. It was a bland at best, but five years later 1847 in Columbian Lady’s and Gentleman’s Magazine, a new expanded version of the story was published under a new title. The Domain of Arnheim.

The expanded version is around fifteen hundred words longer and I would love to say that these extra words fix all the issues with the original ‘story’. This would be something of an ask as one of the main problems with the original story was that it wasn’t a story to begin with. It was in essence just a descriptive piece about a landscape garden. As 19th century descriptive pieces about landscape gardens that are not part of a wider narrative go, it is right up there as one of the best I have ever read, but that isn’t saying a great deal as it is the only one I have ever read that isn’t part of a wider narrative, and I have not read many that are.

Purely descriptive pieces that have no narrative structure are not stories, Stories require a beginning, a middle and an end. Now the beginning does not have to be at the beginning so to speak. nor indeed does the end necessary need to be at the end. I have read, and indeed written stories where the end is quite firmly at the beginning. To be a story there does however need to be a narrative structure, and perhaps more importantly, a narrative.

The landscape garden is not therefore, in my opinion, a story. You can disagree by all means. You can defend our Dear Edgar by pointing out his stories come to us across going on two centuries, so who am I to say what is or is not a story. In my defence I am a man who writes stories… But importantly the question before us is not if the landscape Garden is a story, but if The Domain of Arnheim takes that original non-narrative piece and turn it into a story…?

No it doesn’t.

That is not entirely fair. The extra fifteen hundred words does add a thread of narrative to the story, involving a journey by canoe, but its a thin thread and easily snapped under the strain. There is nothing really here that’s worth the reading. Its the same non-narrative descriptive piece, with a hair beath of narrative connecting it to a second non-narrative descriptive piece. In the end it is just a bit dull and I see little to improve my original verdict beyond, well there is more of it. Which in this case is not really a good thing.

The Raven nevermore…

SHOULD YOU READ IT: No, perhaps if your are a keen gardener…. but no not even then.

BLUFFERS FACT: In the world of the Warhammer RPG and TTB games, Arnheim was a High Elf colony and port city built on the eastern Black Coast of the continent of Naggaroth. Located at the fringe of the Dark Elf domains. This led to it capture and recapture between the warring factions for centuries before it was finally destroyed by the witch king Malekith. It would be nice to say at this point that a garden has grown up among the ruins. It seems unlikely however.