 Contemporary writer Edgar Allan Poe wrote to Longfellow in May 1841 of his " fervent admiration which [ your ] genius has inspired in me " and later called him " unquestionably the best poet in America " . However , after Poe 's reputation as a critic increased , he publicly accused Longfellow of plagiarism in what has been since termed by Poe biographers as " The Longfellow War " . His assessment was that Longfellow was " a determined imitator and a dextrous adapter of the ideas of other people " , specifically Alfred , Lord Tennyson . His accusations may have been a publicity stunt to boost readership of the Broadway Journal , for which he was the editor at the time . Longfellow did not respond publicly , but , after Poe 's death , he wrote : " The harshness of his criticisms I have never attributed to anything but the irritation of a sensitive nature chafed by some indefinite sense of wrong " . 
