Edgar Allan Poe "The boundaries which divide Life and Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where one ends, and where the other begins?" Edgar Allan Poe, The Premature Burial (Bartlett, 642). To venture into the world of Edgar Allan Poe is to embark on a journey to a land filled with perversities of the mind, soul, and body. The joyless existence carved out by his writings is one of lost love, mental anguish, and the premature withering of his subjects. Poe wrote in a style that characterized the sufferings he endured throughout in his pitiful life. From the death of his parents while he was still a child, to the repeated frailty of his love life, to the neuroses of his later years, his life was a ceaseless continuum of one mind-warping tragedy after another. From the very dawning of his existence, Edgar Allan Poe lived a life of hardship; a quality which was reflected in his writings. Poe was born the son of a pair of traveling actors. His father, David, was at best a mediocre actor who soon deserted his wife and son. His mother Elizabeth, on the contrary, was a charming woman and talented actress. His life, no doubt, would have been much different were it not for the fact that she died of tuberculosis in 1811 when Poe was not quite three. This event scarred him for life, for he would always remember "his mother vomiting blood and being carried away from him forever by sinister men dressed in black." (Asselineau, 409). After the traumatic passing of his parents, Poe was placed into the custody of John and Frances Allan – hence his middle name. The childless couple reared him as their own son, even though they would never officially adopt him. He never got along with his foster father, but grew alarmingly... ... middle of paper ... ...is oftentimes tinged with skepticism – but his skepticism is also tinged with fear. However, for all the skepticism and exaggeration, fear always prevails. Bibliography: Allen, Henry. Poe, Edgar Allan. Dictionary of American Biography VIII. Ed. Dumas Malone. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1963: 19-28. Asselineau, Roger. "Edgar Allan Poe." American Writers Vol. III. Ed. Leonard Unger. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1974: 409-432. Bartlett, John. Famous Quotations Fourteenth Edition. Ed. Emily Morison Beck. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1968: 641-644. Bleiler, E.F. "Edgar Allan Poe." Supernatural Fiction Writers: Fantasy and Horror Vol. II. Ed. E.F. Bleiler. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1985: 697-705. Poe Reference, The Definitive. http://www.gothic.net/poe/ Woodbury, George E. Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Chelsea House. 1980.
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... his work lives on, so does the mystery of his death. The purpose of this paper was to examine the disheartening life of such an amazing poet, critic, editor and author and show how influential his success even after death can inspire us to try our hardest despite the circumstances. Poe's life is one of dismay but also of triumph, and we could all learn a great deal from him.
“Poe, Edgar Allan.” Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Britannica online library edition, Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 2013 Web. 13 Nov. 2013.
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Poe, Edgar Allan. "Ligeia." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter 4th ed. Ed. Baym, Nina, et al. New York: WW Norton & Company, 1995. 655-664.
Edgar Allen Poe was born in 1809 to two actors. His father and older brother were both alcoholics. When he was two years old, his father abandoned he and his mother. His mother, being unable to support them both, sent him to live with John and Frances Allen. She died not long after that. The Allen’s gave Poe a good life, but never legally adopted him, which led to him feeling like an outcast. Poe was bullied in school for being the child of actors, which fed into his feeling of not belonging. Poe was later sent to college, and planned to marry Sarah Elmira Royster as soon as he graduated. He eventually had to leave college due to debt, and returned home where he discovered that Sarah was engaged to another man. He then joined West Point Academy for a short time, but did not like it and soon dropped out. After that, Poe moved from job to job until he eventually married his 13 year old cousin, Virginia. Six years later, Virginia fell ill with tuberculosis and died. Poe’s depression deepened, and he later tried to kill ...
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Poe, Edgar Allan. Edgar AllanPoe: Poetry and Tales. Ed. Patrick F. Quinn. New York: Literary Classics of the United States, 1984.
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Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. New York: D. Appleton-Century Company, 1941. Internet.