A Commentary On The Glass

In his “Philosophy of Furniture”, Edgar Allan Poe begins by declaring “In the interior, if not the external architecture of their residences, the English are supreme.” Poe compares the American decorative style with English taste and explains how the differences are based on the lack of nobility of the Americans: the display of money is still the only way of aristocratic distinction. The glare and glitter, Poe says, are the major flaws in the philosophy of American home decor, and inserted as Americans are (or rather were, since it is a publication of over 150 years), in love with glass, among other things like gas lighting.

Poe’s essay invites us to ponder: With a brilliant short story theory, whose modernity is beyond question, “Poe could be wrong on his taste on interior decoration? Impossible, because in matters of taste, “error” is not a category on which to make judgments, but only expressing mere opinions. Do not forget that the ideal of Poe’s room can not be separated from his writings. The decor suggests that Poe is designed to provoke the same effect that produces so brilliantly in his stories, and this must be the only reason for their contempt towards the glass.

For those who worship like Poe and glass should not be plagued by falling into a contradiction. We must first clarify that the “Philosophy of Furniture” Poe should be read as a philosophy of his writing: the glass and mirrors reflectors are seen as mere objects that allude to the realism or mimesis in literature. The lamp, by contrast, is associated with another type of literature, the Romantic. The lamp emits light that is covered by shadows-by-dark areas and never fully illuminates the ambiguity is one of the consequences. Second, the ideal room Poe is designed to lead us into another reality where fantasy and the fantastic-and how the Gothic, to be exact-is possible.

It seems that what bothers Poe, rather than glass, is the proliferation of realistic literature finally reign on the effect of the lamp (even to our days where like most literature ranging from realistic and quite traditional — whose boundaries are already well known, to the other end, with the return of the sagas of wonderful literature) and, following their game, it can also be translated into interior decoration. The glass has become the material of choice in design (from a coffee table or dining table, up to a desktop PC, a TV cabinet or even a porta CD library, and also in architecture, such as station trains in Germany). What does this tell us about ourselves? Why should our inclination towards the glass? Why the glass has become a must-have for any living wishing to express a modern and denote a certain status?

Transparency and openness; reflect light rather than retain it. Modern man uses much of their time indoors, “from home to work and from work to home.” The chaos of the city and the fragmentation of being demanding some sort of unity that it has to seek, of course, in your own home.

The man living in the big city, where space is rationed, you need to create the illusion of space and light. The mirrors are not only useful for reflecting an image but also to multiply the light. They illuminate and to double the spaces, making them appear larger and more enlightened. Clusters of buildings, cars, people, objects, advertisements, images that bombard our senses where to find the simplicity, the “lost unity”? At home, our private modern Eden, we have to say.

The glass is now for us, a need, creates an illusion and gives the modern man the light and space, but also a certain sense of freedom, which so earnestly desires.

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