Laughton Osborn

Laughton Osborn (1809–December 12 1878) was an American poet, playwright, novelist, artist, and musician. and in 1827, graduated from Columbia College.

Most notable today as a fan and correspondent of Edgar Allan Poe, Osborn wrote to him about his loneliness and lack of sympathy from his mother. One day, upon reading an issue of Broadway Journal that he had retrieved from Poe's lodging, he found a negative review of his poem, The Vision of Rubeta. Having been published anonymously, Osborn was grieved with Poe for publishing, rather than writing it, since at the time, Poe was an editor, rather than owner, for the magazine. But Poe reconciled their relationship through a letter, saying the review had passed by him without him ever seeing or knowing of it.

In a letter dated August 15, 1845, Poe wrote to Osborn revealing he did not know Osborn's Confessions of a Poet had been written by him and not John Neal, as was popularly believed at the time. In Poe's The Literati of New York City, he publicly cleared the confusion writing, it "was in two volumes, of the ordinary novel form, but printed very openly. It made much noise in the literary world, and no little curiosity was excited in regard to its author, who was generally supposed to be John Neal." Poe's reasoning behind the confusion centers on it resembling the "boldness and vigour" of Neal's novels, Seventy-Six and Errata. But it may, in part, also have to do with Osborn never having published anything under his own name, as Poe states in The Literati of New York City: "I am not sure that he has published anything with his own name."

Early life, family and education Laughton Osborn was born in New York, New York in 1809. (Although James Grant Wilson in his book, Bryant, And His Friends: Some Reminisces of the Knickerbocker Writers cites 1808 ) The son of Ann and the, at the time, prominent physician, Samuel Osborn, he grew up in a wealthy household where he presumably learned Italian and French.

His dramatic works often spotlight philosophical, moral, and existential themes, focusing on the psychology of characters. These, today, are most commonly, if only, bundled together in volumes instead of individual pieces.

His satirical side is most prominently seen in The Visions of Rebueta where he lampoons Colonel Stone and others after the negative reviews on Confessions.