Deeper Down the Dreamhole - Plunkett,Poe, & More

Be a dungeon master for as long as I have or longer eventually you become the very thing you fear. In Nineteen Seventy Seven I DMed my first original Dungeons & Dragons game sitting on my uncle's lap. Well that's how I remember it & I'm sticking too it. At eleven years old I read  my first Lovecraft Dream cycle story but it wasn't until age twenty that Lord Dunsany entered my life. 'The Book of Wonder' by Lord Dunsany  hit me like a ton of bricks; "The Book of Wonder is the seventh book and fifth original short story collection of Irish fantasy writer Lord Dunsany aka Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, considered a major influence on the work of J. R. R. Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, Ursula K. Le Guin, and others. It was first published in hardcover by William Heinemann in November, 1912, and has been reprinted a number of times since. A 1918 edition from the Modern Library was actually a combined edition with Time and the Gods."  When it comes to iconic Dusany influences "How Nuth Would Have Practised His Art upon the Gnoles"  is an old favorite of mine. Yes its where we get the Gnoll race's name but there's more to it then that. 

Not only does it have the Dusany Appendix N influence but the Dungeons & Dragons Gnoll race takes their name from it.  But my question is this. What happened to the treasure vaults of Nuth afterward? We know he was quite taken with tapestries,gems, various artworks,etc.  

Instead of going whole cloth into  Dusany's gods, & entities I going back to 2012 I let the players fill in the gaps. I learned my lessons after reading through 'Lords of Ultra Realms debacle blog entry  from DC comics going the way back to 2012; "It’s clear from both the overblown Who’s Who entry for Lords of the Ultra-Realm and the work itself that Moench put a good deal of work into creating the lore for his fictional universe. But like a dungeon master who devotes the bulk of his time to meticulous world-building and not enough to narrative, he assumed that the end user would necessarily be as intimately familiar with and personally invested in the litany of fantasy babble as its creator was."

Just because something is a part of a quarter long box at a comic shop doesn't mean its good. There's tons of useless fantasy concepts that litter the pop

culture landscape & even more now. Fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons has seen to that with an e market glut that makes the late Eighties comic book run look like Sunnybrook farm. 



Always go back to the purer source as my uncle would say. Sometimes that means looking past the bargain bins of imagination! Instead grab X2 Castle Amber & drop in the Dunsany influences along with the Clark Ashton Smith. Why?! Because the Clark Ashton Smith literature is becoming a bit too in vogue these days. 

Now its time to trot out that good old Edgar Allen Poe action going right in there. Castle Amber is perfect vehicle to launch our campaign into 'The Twilight World's'. Or your own version of Ravenloft or your own home campaign world of OSR horror. 


Its a moment in time when D&D players don't bother to read the Appendix N stuff. Poe really does need a bit of a resurgence among Dungeons & Dragons players. But the Ushers will be having some lime light coming up! 

Retro Commentary On The Free OSR Literature Download - Edgar Allen Poe'sPoems (1917) As A Campaign Setting Resource For OD&D and and Other Retroclone Systems

 
For months now I've been quietly wracking my brains for a touch stone campaign setting for an October campaign coming up. Over the last few months I've been drifting between OD&D, Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea, and Lamentations of the Flame Princess as alternative Dungeons & Dragons style systems. Al Aaraaf is one of Edgar Allan Poe's least known pieces of weird poetry "Al Aaraaf". Its a strange piece of work and almost nonsensical in places making it perfect fodder for adventure fodder for old school games.The book that I love to use is my beat up 1917 copy of The Poems of Edgar Allan Poe this book is available as a free download from the Internet Archive. This book contains many of Poe's most famous weird poems but tonight I'm going to concentrate on 'Al Aaraaf' as adventure fodder. This was a very contraverstial poem when it was premeired by its author according to Wiki:
"Al Aaraaf", which Poe claimed to have written before he was 15, was first published as the major poem in "Poe's 1829 collection Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and Minor Poems. The book and "Al Aaraaf" in particular received mostly negative reviews for its complexity, obscure references, and odd structure. Some, however, noted the potential in the young poet, including John C. Neal, to whom Poe had shown "Al Aaraaf" prior to publication. Poe would later refer to Neal's response as the first words of encouragement he had received. Nevertheless, the negative response to "Al Aaraaf" may have inspired Poe's later poetic theory that poems should be kept short.
Years later, in 1845, Poe used "Al Aaraaf" to hoax members of the Boston literary circle during a reading. Poe claimed the poem was a new one and his audience was perplexed by it. He later claimed a Boston crowd did not deserve a new poem. He held a strong dislike for New England poets and the New England-based Transcendental movement and hoped by presenting a poem he had written in his youth would prove Bostonians did not know good literature."

So going over my past campaign notes for 'Accursed Atlantis' I was going to utilize 'Al Aaraaf' for a demi plane that is situated between Heaven, Hell, Limbo and the Beyond

The poem contains elements of Orientalism, Metaphysical elements, weird Biblical subtext and some strange fairy tale bits thrown into the background for good measure. According to wiki :
Al Aaraaf" is the longest poem Poe wrote^[1] and was inspired by Tycho Brahe's discovery of a supernova back in 1572 which was visible for about seventeen months.^[2] Poe identified this nova with Al Aaraaf, a star that was the place between paradise and hell. Al-A`raaf (Arabic الأعراف, alternatively transcribed Aʿraf or Al Orf) was a place where people who have been neither markedly good nor markedly bad had to stay until forgiven by God and let into Paradise,^[3] as discussed in Sura 7 of the Qur'an.^[4] As Poe explained to a potential publisher:

Its title is "Al Aaraaf" from the Al Aaraaf of the Arabians, a medium between Heaven and Hell where men suffer no punishment, but yet do not attain that tranquil & even happiness which they suppose to be the characteristics of heavenly enjoyment.^[3]

In the opening section of the poem, God commands Nesace, a name for Beauty's spirit, to convey a message to "other worlds". Nesace rouses the angel Ligeia and tells her to awaken the other thousand seraphs to perform God's work. Two souls, however, fail to respond: the "maiden-angel" Ianthe and her "seraph-lover" Angelo (Michelangelo), who describes his death on earth and the flight of his spirit to Al Aaraaf. Ianthe and Angelo are lovers, and their failure to do as Nesace commanded results in God not allowing them into heaven.
William Heath Robinson did some wonderful illustrations and art pieces for various Poe stories over the years and for me it speaks of a place where the intersection of life and death meet with the places of dream.

Here's part one :

O! nothing earthly save the ray
(Thrown back from flowers) of Beauty's eye,
As in those gardens where the day
Springs from the gems of Circassy –
O! nothing earthly save the thrill
Of melody in woodland rill –
Or (music of the passion-hearted)
Joy's voice so peacefully departed
That like the murmur in the shell,
Its echo dwelleth and will dwell –
Oh, nothing of the dross of ours –
Yet all the beauty – all the flowers
That list our Love, and deck our bowers –
Adorn yon world afar, afar –
The wandering star.

'Twas a sweet time for Nesace – for there
Her world lay lolling on the golden air,
Near four bright suns – a temporary rest –
A garden-spot in desert of the blest.
Away – away – 'mid seas of rays that roll
Empyrean splendor o'er th' unchained soul –
The soul that scarce (the billows are so dense)
Can struggle to its destin'd eminence, –
To distant spheres, from time to time, she rode
And late to ours, the favor'd one of God –
But, now, the ruler of an anchor'd realm,
She throws aside the sceptre – leaves the helm,
And, amid incense and high spiritual hymns,
Laves in quadruple light her angel limbs.

Now happiest, loveliest in yon lovely Earth,
Whence sprang the "Idea of Beauty" into birth,
(Falling in wreaths thro' many a startled star,
Like woman's hair 'mid pearls, until, afar,
It lit on hills Achaian, and there dwelt)
She looked into Infinity – and knelt.
Rich clouds, for canopies, about her curled –
Fit emblems of the model of her world –
Seen but in beauty – not impeding sight
Of other beauty glittering thro' the light –
A wreath that twined each starry form around,
And all the opal'd air in color bound.

All hurriedly she knelt upon a bed
Of flowers: of lilies such as rear'd the head
^[1]On the fair Capo Deucato, and sprang
So eagerly around about to hang
Upon the flying footsteps of – deep pride –
^[2]Of her who lov'd a mortal – and so died.
The Sephalica, budding with young bees,
Upreared its purple stem around her knees:—
^[3]And gemmy flower, of Trebizond misnam'd –
Inmate of highest stars, where erst it sham'd
All other loveliness: – its honied dew
(The fabled nectar that the heathen knew)
Deliriously sweet, was dropp'd from Heaven,
And fell on gardens of the unforgiven
In Trebizond – and on a sunny flower
So like its own above that, to this hour,
It still remaineth, torturing the bee
With madness, and unwonted reverie:
In Heaven, and all its environs, the leaf
And blossom of the fairy plant in grief
Disconsolate linger – grief that hangs her head,
Repenting follies that full long have Red,
Heaving her white breast to the balmy air,
Like guilty beauty, chasten'd and more fair:
Nyctanthes too, as sacred as the light
She fears to perfume, perfuming the night:
^[4]And Clytia, pondering between many a sun,
While pettish tears adown her petals run:
And that aspiring flower that sprang on Earth,
And died, ere scarce exalted into birth,
Bursting its odorous heart in spirit to wing
Its way to Heaven, from garden of a king:
^[5]And Valisnerian lotus, thither flown
From struggling with the waters of the Rhone:
^[6]And thy most lovely purple perfume, Zante!
Isola d'oro! – Fior di Levante!
^[7]And the Nelumbo bud that floats for ever
With Indian Cupid down the holy river –
Fair flowers, and fairy! to whose care is given
^[8]To bear the Goddess' song, in odours, up to Heaven:

    "Spirit! that dwellest where,
    In the deep sky,
    The terrible and fair,
    In beauty vie!
    Beyond the line of blue –
    The boundary of the star
    Which turneth at the view
    Of thy barrier and thy bar –
    Of the barrier overgone
    By the comets who were cast
    From their pride and from their throne
    To be drudges till the last –
    To be carriers of fire
    (The red fire of their heart)
    With speed that may not tire
    And with pain that shall not part –
    Who livest – that we know –
    In Eternity – we feel –
    But the shadow of whose brow
    What spirit shall reveal?
    Tho' the beings whom thy Nesace,
    Thy messenger, hath known
    Have dream'd for thy Infinity
    ^[9]A model of their own –
    Thy will is done, O God!
    The star hath ridden high
    Thro' many a tempest, but she rode
    Beneath thy burning eye;
    And here, in thought, to thee –
    In thought that can alone
    Ascend thy empire and so be
    A partner of thy throne –
    ^[10]By winged Fantasy,
    My embassy is given,
    Till secrecy shall knowledge be
    In the environs of Heaven."

She ceas'd – and buried then her burning cheek
Abash'd, amid the lilies there, to seek
A shelter from the fervor of His eye;
For the stars trembled at the Deity.
She stirr'd not – breath'd not – for a voice was there
How solemnly pervading the calm air!
A sound of silence on the startled ear
Which dreamy poets name "the music of the sphere."
Ours is a world of words: Quiet we call
"Silence" – which is the merest word of all.
All Nature speaks, and ev'n ideal things
Flap shadowy sounds from visionary wings –
But ah! not so when, thus, in realms on high
The eternal voice of God is passing by,
And the red winds are withering in the sky: –

^[11]"What tho 'in worlds which sightless cycles run,
Linked to a little system, and one sun –
Where all my love is folly and the crowd
Still think my terrors but the thunder cloud,
The storm, the earthquake, and the ocean-wrath –
(Ah! will they cross me in my angrier path?)
What tho' in worlds which own a single sun
The sands of Time grow dimmer as they run,
Yet thine is my resplendency, so given
To bear my secrets thro' the upper Heaven!
Leave tenantless thy crystal home, and fly,
With all thy train, athwart the moony sky –
^[12]Apart – like fire-flies in Sicilian night,
And wing to other worlds another light!
Divulge the secrets of thy embassy
To the proud orbs that twinkle – and so be
To ev'ry heart a barrier and a ban
Lest the stars totter in the guilt of man!"

Up rose the maiden in the yellow night,
The single-mooned eve! – on Earth we plight
Our faith to one love – and one moon adore –
The birth-place of young Beauty had no more.
As sprang that yellow star from downy hours
Up rose the maiden from her shrine of flowers,
And bent o'er sheeny mountains and dim plain
^[13]Her way, but left not yet her Therasaean reign.

You can read the poem in its entirety right over here

The thought of Poe's works put me in the mind of A Night On Bald Mountain.

Maybe because of Halloween and October coming on like a bear this year, one week its sunny and lovely next its freezing. This is New England for you but one thing it does do is inspire and I've been blitzing on watching the Phantasm series of films again. The second and third films are sheer wall to wall horror crawls in haunted houses, the planes of the dead, the worlds largest mausoleums, funeral homes, etc. So I started thinking about the fact that a renagade fallen angel of death could play merry havoc with reality if he started using a demi plane to raid various realities and dimensions to collect the souls of the living. No reality could be safe from such an entity. Several monsters from D&D spring to mind here. Free willed Ju Ju zombies, mummies, vampires, and damned souls all come to mind.


I have dreams about this entity's realm howling out in the Black Void of other dimensional space chewing up realms and making one gigantic cemetery of a world. Nothing is safe, this world is all that remains of Old Earth. Each world that "Al Aaraaf" touches is invaded and taken over by the undead and its deadly dark necomatic magicks. Magic items from this realm are especially dangerous. After getting off of the phone with the artist Gennifer Bone one of her pieces of art seems to encompass this fact in spades.

When it comes to this sort of a realm we're looking at a mix of haunted reality overlapping the realms of death and insanity. This is the type of late night three am mix of 80's horror films, deep occult themes, and deadly insanity in equal measure. But it doesn't have to necessarily be entirely serious. The undead here can be completely Evil Dead or Re animator mutated and the monsters have a far more old school Disney aesthetic. Think Night on Bald Mountain from Fantasia here.Given the sort of a demi plane invasion and overlaying effect that this place has it can easily bring itself into other realms. No place is really safe at all. Any game setting or realm might be subject to the ghastly attentions of 'Al Aaraaf'. A random encounter chart from 'Al Aaraaf' might look something like this.



1d6 'Al Aaraaf' Random Encounter Chart

1. 1d4 semi demonic ghostly apporations created from the wrecked spirits of departed adventurers. They are looking to feast on the souls of the living. 
2. A pack of 1d8 demonic ghostly highway men on nightmares looking to strip the living of all that they have including their lives. 
3. 1d8 ghost like imps, goblins, and least Lovecraftian horrors rippling about in a miasma cloud of horror looking to rip apart the living and violate their very beings. 
4. A trio of undead zombie drunkards who are actually cunning monsters out to kill anything that they run across. 
5. An inhuman demon veiled warrior woman on the back of something that resembles a locust with a human face looking for human souls for her dark master.  4th level warrior with demonic powers. 
6. A pack of undead zombie motorcycle riders with black powder guns and rifles out for prey and 'fun'. 2nd level fighters.

This realm need not be all darkness and hate, there are spots of ghastly fun and high weirdness. This is just the sort of venue that Judge's Guild's Tegel manor is perfect for. A lone location with its own internal adventure mechanisms and megadungeon location. Adventurers can easily stumble headlong into its horrors and madness. All of it transcending time, space, and sanity. The funhouse aspect of this adventure  makes this a solid fit and there's really very little that the PC's can do to take away from the encounters per say.  More to come. In the meantime try not to get caught in the webs of
"Al Aaraaf"'s clutches.

Retrocommentary On The Free OSR Download - The Haunted Palace By Edgar Allen Poe For The Lamentations of the Flame Princess Rpg and Other Retroclone Systems

With Fall definitely on its way here in Connecticut I've been rereading a bit of Edgar Allen Poe and especially his poetry. Mostly because Poe's poems seem almost over looked by the OSR community to draw adventures from. Going over my copy of the free  Lamentations of the Flame Princess Referee's book there were certain things that stood out to me. The advice of the book on adventure design seemed tailor made for Poe's Haunted Palace.

Read It Right Over
Here

Today we're going to be talking about using another Edgar Allen Poe poem as the basis for an adventure encounter in the Lamentations of the Flame Princess rpg. There are several reasons for doing this, one its one of his lesser known works of poetry, two its most often been dovetailed into the Fall of the House of Usher and three it easily can be used for challenging & yet deadly adventure encounter. We're actually offered our first clue how to incorporate the Haunted Palace into an adventure by Wiki :

The poem serves as an allegory about a king "in the olden time long ago" who is afraid of evil forces that threaten him and his palace, foreshadowing impending doom. As part of "The Fall of the House of Usher", Poe said, "I mean to imply a mind haunted by phantoms — a disordered brain" ^[1] referring to Roderick Usher.
The poem takes a marked change in tone towards the second to last stanza. After discussing the wit and wisdom of the king, and song and beauty in the kingdom:

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,

Assailed the monarch's high estate.

The house and family are destroyed and, apparently, become phantoms.
The beginning of the poem compares the structure with a human head. For example, the windows are eyes, its door representing a mouth. The exterior represents physical features while the interior represents the mind engaged in imaginative thought
Once again, I was reminded of Dore's artwork, after rereading the poem several times. The idea of doing a giant skull like map with the various points and structure of a human head does have a certain appeal.

There is a certain sense of doom and darkness that surrounds the poem and that makes it ideal as an adventure location. Is the king a wizard whose magick has infected the lands, his entire estate,and the palace with his madness. Has the entire palace become unhinged in time and space, a place isolated from the rest of the normal world? The thing that sprang to mind with this poem was the bubble of space time in No Salvation For Witches.

The magick of the king has long since isolated the location from the rest of the world. Entering the bubble brings the characters straight into the waiting arms of the weirdness of the Haunted Palace. Perhaps the structure of the palace compared to a human head is more then merely an allegory.Perhaps its a part of the demonic ecology of the landscape. Birds, plants, etc. are all weirdly twisted and tied into a mind haunted by phantoms — a disordered brain. If we begin deconstructing the narrative of the poem we're left with the narrator, the palace, the phantoms, and the events of the poem itself. All of this can easily be constructed into an adventure.



THE HAUNTED PALACE.

---

In the greenest of our valleys

 By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace—
 Radiant palace—reared its head.
In the monarch Thought's dominion—
 It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
 Over fabric half so fair!

Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
 On its roof did float and flow,
(This—all this—was in the olden
 Time long ago,)
And every gentle air that dallied,
 In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
 A wingéd odour went away.

Wanderers in that happy valley,
Through two luminous windows, saw
Spirits moving musically,
To a lute's well-tunéd law,
Round about a throne where, sitting
(Porphyrogene!)
In state his glory well befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.

And all with pearl and ruby glowing

 Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
 And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty
 Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
 The wit and wisdom of their king.

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
 Assailed the monarch's high estate.
(Ah, let us mourn!—for never morrow
 Shall dawn upon him desolate!)
And round about his home the glory
 That blushed and bloomed,
Is but a dim-remembered story
 Of the old time entombed.

And travellers, now, within that valley,
 Through the red-litten windows see
Vast forms, that move fantastically
 To a discordant melody,
While, like a ghastly rapid river,
 Through the pale door
A hideous throng rush out forever
 And laugh—but smile no more.

Constructing the Frame Work of Poe's The Haunted Palace  As
An Old School Adventure
Because of the very nature of the Haunted Palace, the haunted part makes this location weird from the start and contents of the palace are almost but not quite going to be truly and deeply haunted. And this is what's key to running this adventure, this is a location whose time has long since passed and yet nothing realizes it. Phantoms, ghosts, and other supernatural entitiYnes are going to be encountered and lives are going to be altered forever. The Palace, its grounds, the NPC's all exist in a realm that straddles the planes of dream, death, and possibly the underworld. This is an adventure whose's ghosts and spirits are going to possibly be very,very dangerous. Several of the random monsters in this adventure might possibly sport powers and abilities randomly rolled from No Salvation of Witche's random generators to give the NPC's something unique and very,very dangerous.

So the motive for visiting the Haunted Palace is simply human greed. Even over the warped distances the Haunted Palace has been whispered about in taverns and brothels across the pseudo historical Europe. This will bring good adventurers and horrors together time and again. The fact that the mansion exists outside of normal space time brings plenty of cross over potential for OSR campaigns. There's a black metal feel to the poem and this enables a DM to take this place into the realms of Silent Hill or some other supernatural horror survival game. Another possibility is that none of the adventure locations or NPC's are actually real? Besides what if the entire adventure location, all of the monsters, and more are actually the product of the king's deranged mind.
Adventure Location Encounter
Table Based On The Haunted Palace

1. Ghosts and spirits drawn to the magick of the king's misery and insanity. These horrors will be more dangerous then regular ghosts and the like. 
2. Ghostly staff and servants who are not aware that they are dead but will turn instantly to try and kill PC's in a murderous rage. 
3. Cursed objects or treasures in weird places. 
4. Angel of Death whose hold on the place is almost absolute. And this allows the DM plenty of excuses to mess with time, space, aimed right at the PC's. 
5. The ghosts and phantoms of other former adventurers haunt strange corners of this palace ready to deal out pain to those who disturb their slumber. 
6. The king himself who may be a dangerous and deranged undead wizard king just waiting for fresh adventurers.

Actually Using Edgar Allen Poe'sUnderworld
For Your Old School Campaigns

There are several ways of using Poe's Haunt Palace, one is as a time lost adventure location that exists on the edge of the realms or planes of dream and death. The  events are separated from normality because of the location. What you will need is the Lamentations of the Flame Princess Referee's Grind House Edition book .This book has some outstanding reference points in it for adventure generation and the maintenance of adventure locations. The beginning adventure a Stranger Storm could be used as a perfect excuse to have a party of adventurers blunder into the location of the Haunted Palace. This place could be used as a great cross over retroclone adventure location with various adventurers wandering into the reality of the Haunt Palace. This is a great way to introduce some of the adventurers of Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea to their LoFP counterparts. Given the other worldly and dreamlike quality of the doom laden nature The Haunted Palace I can easily see it as a part of the Dream cycle of HP Lovecraft. This also means that the influences and set up for use makes Poe's Underworld perfect adventure fodder for  a Red and Pleasant land its an easy leap to have the timeless adventure location that I've thumbnail sketched out be a perfect cross over point.  One of the things that makes Poe's work timeless is the fact that it fits so many points of horror fiction so easily. The Gothic set up is a nice way to introduce some of the dark aspects of Rpg Pundit's Dark Albion. The time lost quality of the adventure location, the deeply disturbing nature of the Haunted Palace, some of the weird bits of the setting, and more make this a perfectly exploitable Dark Albion adventure location. The palace can lure adventurers to their doom as it continues its journey across space and time luring adventurers and freebooters to their doom. 

Retro Commentary On The Free OSR Literature Download - The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe With Artwork By Gustave Dore For The Lamentations of the Flame Princess Rpg and Other Retroclone Systems

The Raven is one of Edgar Allen Poe's seminal pieces of weird poetry and one of the most under utilized pieces of adventure fodder for old school games. Today we're going to be talking about plugging this classic piece of Gothic poetry into the Lamentations of the Flame Prince game

Grab it Right
HERE 

So its getting towards Fall here in Connecticut and I'm thinking again about future OSR campaign adventures and one idea that I had was turning into my Lamentations Of The Flame Princess notes. I rereading my Grind house box set and came to the section on Edgar Allen Poe .One of the articles that's been making the rounds is  on Edgar Allen Poe's Raven with artwork by Gustav Dore. And my question is why hasn't anyone made a commerically viable dungeon or adventure location crawl out of this classic by Poe?  All of the elements are there for a crawl especially with Dore's incredible engraved illustrations. Poe is one of the most easily accessible and interesting American authors of horror, weird tales, and adventure that crosses the desk of most middle school kids and yet I've seen adaptions of his works for Call of Cthulhu, TSR's Masque of The Red Death  Ravenloft setting, and yet a quick Google search turned up not a single OSR role playing adventure.  Just in case you've never heard the Raven by the late great Sir Christopher Lee here you go.


Gustave Dore never saw the publication of his wonderful work into the public in 1883, he had died at the ripe old age of fifty one. But it was his artwork that really brings home the power of the poem. Wonderful, sublime, and beautiful and yet beyond  haunting is this poem. But don't let's its reputation keep you the DM from accessing it as fodder for an adventure especially for the LoFP system.

So here's the poem and let's begin to deconstruct this wonderful work and see what can be done with it. Right out of the gate we've got several NPC's to work with, The unnamed Narrator, Lenore, and the Raven.In the Dore artwork we are given wonderful engravings filled with visions of ghosts, angels, the angel of death, minor horrors all lurking in the background of it. Here's what I'm going to do take Dore's artwork and construct an adventure structure straight out of it using the poem as the frame work. Let's take a look at the poem itself. 
 

ONCE upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'T is some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door;	5
Only this and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore,	10
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore:
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating	15
"'T is some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door,
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door:
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;	20
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you"—here I opened wide the door:—
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,	25
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?"
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore:"
Merely this and nothing more.	30
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore;
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore:	35
'T is the wind and nothing more."
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door,	40
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door:
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,—
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven,	45
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore:
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;	50
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door,
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as "Nevermore."
But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only	55
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered, not a feather then he fluttered,
Till I scarcely more than muttered,—"Other friends have flown before;
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before."
Then the bird said, "Nevermore."	60
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore:
Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore	65
Of 'Never—nevermore.'
But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore,	70
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining	75
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.	80
"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!"
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore."
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! prophet still, if bird or devil!	85
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—
On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore:
Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."	90
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil—prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us, by that God we both adore,
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore:
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore!"	95
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting:
"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! quit the bust above my door!	100
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,	105
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor:
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore! Constructing the Frame Work of Poe's The Raven As An Old School Adventure The home depicted in Dore's artwork is twisted and odd filled with motifs of death, change, love, the unconscious self, nature, the human imagination, hope & despair,etc. All singularly wonderful fodder to place the PC's at the center of the cross roads of life and the afterlife. The home of the narrator is caught outside of time and space existing in a timeless limbo with both the nameless narrator & Lenore's ghost caught in the repeating cycle of horror and despair of the house. There are ten easy reasons to construct the adventure using the Lamentations of the Flame Princess Rules and Magic book  to start with; The narrator of the poem was a wizard who used a variation of the first level summon spell to call back the ghost of his beloved Lenore. The Grim Reaper took offense from this violation of its domain and now the entire mansion and grounds have been moved to its own location in the underworld.  The Raven of the title is another aspect of the Grim Reaper forever keeping watch over the NPC's. The adventurers are not the first to try and raid the house as it continues its journey throughout time and space.  Random encounters within the environs of the house include minor angels and demons who inhabit the timeless limbo. Some for good or ill mostly for ill given that this is a LoFP adventure.  Opportunities for looting and mayhem abound but there is also the possibility of encountering cursed objects and magickal items of entropy and death.  This adventure could be used as a jump off point for an old school campaign as we shall see  The horrors of the Underworld are not going to stay at bay. Demons and their ilks should be generated using the tables from the Summoning spell from the LoFP rule book.  For a really black metal feel to this sort of adventure the PC themselves might be dead, shades of Silent Hill and other classic horror films.  There is far more horror going on as the PC's find all the members of the mansion or house's staff have been murdered to perform the rite that summoned Lenore.  Lenore isn't real at all and a figment of the deranged, diseased mind of the wizard himself. Or is in fact a phantom of the fool's soul.  The NPC raven isn't too happy about the arrival of the PC's and begins to arrange for the PC's death's ten little Indians style.    Adventure Location Encounter Table Based On The Raven Demonic raven with various mutations from the LoFP summoning spell table  1d8 books of forbidden lore with appropriate horrific spells based on Poe's tales.  Shadows and ghosts of ancestors of the narrator walled up in various secret points in the house.  Servants of the angel of Death  Alien horrors from beyond in some of the rooms, these encounters move randomly as day becomes night and so forth.  The shades and undead of other freebooters and other adventurers who have encountered the house.  Cursed objects and weird effects of the house itself.  The ghost or dream self of Lenore plus random damned souls who wander into the house. Weird demonic animals out on the grounds of the house.  Strange sights and lights in the sky.    A Table Of Ten Random Location Encounter Areas & Notes Alchemy laboratory and summoning room the first weird location that resonates with the aura of decay and demonic, the place has a sort of Devil Rides Out aura about it.   The Library - A place filled with volumes of forgotten and forbidden lore. Also a location for a cursed object or two  Chapel - The perfect location for an encounter with the Angel of Death, the Raven, or a Demon. The whole place should have oppressive and weird atmosphere. Small dungeon and torture chamber where the servants and staff of the house were 'retired'.  Small barn, horse stables, and servants quarters plenty of opportunities for weirdness or monsters  Family crypt - what's an Edgar Allan Poe adventure without a buried alive or bursting crypt of the ancestors. Also a great place to encounter a ghost or two.  Secret Compartments& chambers - small forbidden black magick libraries, walled up ancestor's skeletons, forbidden secrets, secret chambers are perfect encounter points.  Abandoned or weird house sections or rooms - The house gains or loses a hallway, room, section,etc.  Ghosts, spirits,etc of the dead at the windows as the plot of the adventure progresses.  Adventurers encounter a dead PC or NPC alive almost as if nothing ever happened to them. Then suddenly the wounds of their death appear across the body. Death has taken them already and their trapped along with all of the rest of the members of the house.  Actually Using Edgar Allen Poe's The Raven For Your Old School Campaigns  Alright here it goes. There are several ways of actually using the Raven as an adventure location. The first of which is to simply use the time lost location of the mansion and its half mad wizard narrator as another loot point only to discover far  too late that the LoFP train has left. I seen several references on boards about how fire arms will make an impact. Once again given the nature of wizards, undead in LFP such as Death, Frost, Doom and the fire arms issue will make very little impact. What you will need is the Lamentations of the Flame Princess Referee's Grind House Edition book . The beginning adventure a Stranger Storm could be used as a perfect jump point for the Raven. The PC's are thrust into the circumstances of that adventure only to find themselves neck deep into the events of the cycle of the Raven. Then theirs the conversion charts that Guide provides for jumping between the various retroclones on the market currently, very handy things to have as we shall see. Other possibilities for using the events, NPC's and materials of the Raven also include Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea PC's. The translation between the two games is almost seamless. Now given the Dream cycle of HP Lovecraft and the dreamlike qualities of such an adventure location its easy to see this sort of a place being used as a cross over point. In fact given the alien nature of the LoFP demi human races its easy to see them used as fodder for an OSR death and dream adventuring style campaign. Given the entirely weird and dreamlike qualities of a Red and Pleasant land its an easy leap to have the timeless adventure location that I've thumbnail sketched out be used as simply another branch in the other dimensional river   This is one of the qualities of Poe's work that makes it endlessly timeless and adaptable is that it can cross over into a new generation's material. This style of campaign makes it easy to see it being slid into Rpg Pundit's Dark Albion given the unhinged in time and space aspect of the Raven's adventure location. There are three things that work in Dark Albion's favor for Poe's Raven. The dark nature of the spiritual entities and patrons at work here. The ghosts, demons, etc. that exist on the border of the mundane and the horrific. The mansion can continue its journey across space and time luring adventurers and freebooters to their doom.  As I go about the mental exercise of constructing another adventure location, the dark echoes of Albion seem to wash against the lapping waters of the realms of the dead. More to come.