Footnotes to the TV series
POE 1: I’m sure it was ’32. I’m sad to say it was the same year my older brother William passed away.
POE 2: Okay, that’s not right either, Fred.
Edgar Allen Poe had an older brother named William Henry Leonard Poe, born in 1807. He went by his middle name, Henry. Henry Poe died in 1831, a few months after Edgar Allan Poe left West Point.
The first Poe has once again got things muddled.
POE 1: It was an election year [that Poe was court-martialled].
POE 2: It was not an election year. President Jackson was to serve five more years.
President Andrew Jackson, previously discussed.
He became president in 1829 and was in office until 1837, so in 1831, President Jackson actually had six more years to serve, not five. Both Poes manage to be incorrect this time.
MISS PATTY: When you were six and took my cheerleading class, you wouldn’t even cheer for any other school than Harvard.
The number of classes that Rory took with Miss Patty as a little girl keeps increasing. Ballet, tap dance, baton twirling, and now cheerleading! How did she end up so awkward?
LORELAI: Or complain when he goes back to being Fred Larson, Tampa dentist.
Tampa, a city on the Gulf Coast in Florida with a population of around 380 000. A military centre during the 19th century, today the city’s economy is driven by tourism, health care, finance, insurance, technology, construction, and the maritime industry. Lorelai has something of an obsession with thinking everyone staying at an inn or B&B is a dentist.
[Dean sees them and waves. Lindsay glances at Rory]
LORELAI: Oh, I think she’s ready to go to the ghetto on you.
Possibly a reference to the 1998 hip-hop song, “The Geto”, by the rapper Scarface, featuring Willie D, Ice Cube, and K.B, from the album, My Homies. One part says, ” … got to go, to the ghetto”. If so, it may be an attempt to make us believe Lorelai’s earlier assertion that she is “into rap”. It sort of ends up seeming a bit racist.
RORY: He was a troubled man. He enjoyed a little bit too much of the hmm-hmm. [makes a drinking gesture]
Edgar Allan Poe has been described as a drunkard or an alcoholic, but many of these stories about him were spread by his rivals and enemies. He did sometimes drink too much, and didn’t handle alcohol very well (so that even a little was probably too much for him), but it was often months or even years between bouts of drinking. He might perhaps be best described as a binge drinker. It is sometimes speculated that alcohol played some part in his death, but this cannot be verified.
MANAGER: [to Luke]Hey. Saw you jawboning with our boy there.
Jawboning, informal American English meaning to influence or pressure by strong persuasion, usually used in a political context. Luke wasn’t really doing anything like that with Jess, so either the manager is being very protective of his star worker, or he is confusing the word with jawing, meaning “to talk, to scold”.
LORELAI: You said you were with the Poe Society.
FRED: Yeah, but it’s just a hobby. We’re not Trekkies.
Trekkies, previously discussed.
In this episode, the Poe Society members seem to be exactly like Trekkies!
LORELAI: Oh, is this everyone from the Edgar Allan Poe Society?
The Edgar Allen Poe Society was established in Baltimore, Maryland on January 19 1923, the 114th anniversary of Poe’s birth. Their headquarters are The Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum, which was the home of Poe during the 1830s. The Poe Society are all volunteers who aim to provide educational resources on the author, and are not as quirky as this episode portrays. Perhaps the ones in this episode are a different Edgar Allan Poe Society.
SOOKIE: Papaya won’t eat, so I’m pretending to eat out of her bowl so she’ll copy me.
LORELAI: Sookie, you named the cat?
Papaya (Carica papaya), also known as pawpaw. A tropical fruit first domesticated in Mesoamerica, within modern-day southern Mexico and Central America. Spaniards introduced papaya to Europe in the 16th century. Papaya cultivation today spans Hawaii, central Africa, India, and Australia. India produces more papaya than any other country.
Babette had a cat named Cinnamon, and then got a kitten named Apricot. Women like calling their cats after food on this show. Sookie has committed numerous health and safety offences in the kitchen of the Independence Inn – now she is feeding a stray cat on the floor! They should have really have been shut down years ago.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 