Landor’s Cottage (1849) is the last short story by the American author Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849). It describes how a traveler gets lost in an uncanny, unspoiled landscape in the valley of the Hudson River and there experiences nature as a grand spectacle. This story inspired Rodney Graham to his literary work The System of Landor’s Cottage, the first edition of which appeared in 1987. Graham expanded Poe’s story into a novel by means of additions and insertions, following the literary principle of the French writer Raymond Roussel (1877–1933). He had developed a poetic method for dismantling texts and reassembling them with a different meaning.
The word “Vathek” on the red box of the deluxe edition of The System of Landor’s Cottage refers to the eponymous Gothic novel by William Beckford (1760–1844), which Edgar Allan Poe quotes in his short story.
Rodney Graham repeatedly engaged artistically with literary works and combined them into a network of references and cross-references, as Vathek – System of Landor’s Cottage (2012) shows.
The series also includes: The System of Landor’s Cottage. A Pendant to Poe’s Last Story (2012); The System of Landor’s Cottage. A Pendant to Poe’s Last Story (2012); The System of Landor’s Cottage. A Pendant to Poe’s Last Story (2012); The System of Landor’s Cottage. A Pendant to Poe’s Last Story (2012)
