An Enigma, written by Edgar Allen Poe, is a very perplexing poem that can cause the reader to have to read it more than once to fully understand its meaning. Although a fairly short poem, there is much meaning hidden beneath it.

A large part of the poem is quoted from Solomon Don Dunce and his feelings about sonnets and other poetic literature. It seems as if he is criticizing and degrading the works of Italians because he makes reference to Naples bonnet (a port and tourist center in Southwestern Italy) and also to Petrarchan (an Italian poet and scholar who wrote many love lyrics) by saying that the "stuff" is nonsense and flimsy. After Poe is through with quoting Solomon Don Dunce, he goes on to call the works of Henry Theodore Tuckerman, who also wrote sonnets, "ephemeral and so transparent." He refers to his works as...