Edgar Allan Poe: Reality Reflected Through Horror

It was once said by Edgar Allan Poe that, “Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.” It was no mystery Poe’s stories were dark, and at many times, frightful. Even though many thought of him as a deranged lunatic, the exquisite horror of his reality shaped his stories. Poe’s life is considered a reflection of his stories by the results of disease, mental illness, and emotions.

Poe, many times throughout his life, mourned the losses of loved ones who passed away from diseases, the idea of what he experienced through his existence encouraged him to implement illnesses into his own stories. Poe created many fictional but inhumane sicknesses that went along with the plot of his stories, one in particular

Living with with mental illness throughout his life, it has inspired him to add intellectual illnesses in his tales. Poe received mental illnesses before his death that occurred soon after, “his drinking was most likely” the reason he endured an abundance of mental illnesses (“The Psychology of Edgar Allan Poe”). By understanding intellectual illnesses from his life, Poe could incorporate mental illnesses into his stories. The narrator of one of Poe’s story says: “The disease had sharpened my senses – not destroyed – not dulled them” (Poe, “The Tell-Tale Heart”). The main character of the story is suffering from an intellectual illness that affected the narrator's sense during the story, Poe ties this sickness to the plot of the story and to the illness that he obtained during his life. While Poe suffered from masses of mental illnesses, it was not the only mental factor that impacted Poe's story style and even his way of living. His emotions had a significant affect on how his stories began and

Well-known tales, such as The Cask of Amontillado, have character’s actions derived from emotions they feel. Montressor stated: “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best as I could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge”(Poe, “The Cask”). Montresor's burning ambition to murder Fortunato is derived from his feelings of anger which guides the reader through the main plot. Poe does this by building suspense and using key words. Alcohol influences the mood in Poe’s stories too, a man who was benevolent to all creatures soon obtained a “more than fiendish malevolence” to his cat, Pluto (Poe, “The Black Cat”). Alcohol is the culprit for mood-swings in many of Poe’s stories, many predict Poe’s alcoholism and feelings toward the effect to be the inspiration for plenty of his stories. Poe was inspired by multiple other reasons to create dark stories, these were just a few that are noticed throughout all of his