Edgar Allan Poe is a very well known short stories author as well as a poet in the 1800 and even now. He has written many short stories, and all of these stories always has a deeper meaning to what he’s saying. This makes the readers think more than they normally would in other short stories and also make it so that the reader can find out more about it indirectly. His life had never been a normal happy life. He was in the same room with his brother when his mother died. He was there for two days with the dead body of his own mother which must have brought on trauma. It seems like he was also used to the concept of death to lead him to write such stories. Some short stories that will be analyzed are The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Pit and the Pendulum, and The Oval Portrait. Edgar Allan Poe’s childhood affected his style which led him to write about sadness and heartbreak. Because Poe’s wife had died of tuberculosis, he became very sad and used drugs and alcohol to overcome his loss. What made him even more depressed was the fact that the day before Virginia, Poe’s wife, had passed away, he had written a letter to his aunt saying that there was no sign of her getting better but she’s not dead yet. This event in his life must have given him the idea to include women in his stories.
When reading “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” the first thing that came into mind
was that this story was weird and obviously sick. There didn’t seem to be any deep dark meaning
though. An orangutan had gone crazy and killed two women. It seemed straight-forward. In
“The Pit and the Pendulum” it seems that Poe feels like he’s trapped and hopeless because he tries to break free but doesn’t until the mice gnaw the ropes. It’s as if he doesn’t...
... middle of paper ...
...& so sad a life, be exprest [sic] & comprest in on line — would it not be best to say of Poe in a
reverential spirit simply Requiescat in Pace [?]” — (Alfred Lord Tennyson’s reply to the Poe
Memorial committee, February 18, 1876
Works Cited
Ackroyd, Peter. Poe: a Life Cut Short. London: Chatto & Windus, 2007.
Giordano, Robert. "A short biography of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)." 27 June 2005. 5 April
2009
Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism. Ed. Lynn M. Zott. Vol. 117. Detroit: Gale, 2003. P
43-62. From Literature Resource Center.
Poe, Edgar Allan. The Gold-Bug and Other Tales. Toronto, Canada: General Publshing
Company, Ltd., 1991.
"Primary Source Documents." Knowing Poe. 2002. Maryland Historical Society. 3 Apr
2009.
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Show MoreCentury Interpretations of Poe’s Tales. Ed. William L. Howarth. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1971.
The writing style of Edgar Allan Poe shows the writer to be of a dark nature. In this story, he focuses on his fascination of being buried alive. He quotes, “To be buried alive is, beyond question, the most terrific of these [ghastly] extremes which has ever fallen to the lot of mere mortality.” page 58 paragraph 3. The dark nature is reflected in this quote, showing the supernatural side of Poe which is reflected in his writing and is also a characteristic of Romanticism. Poe uses much detail, as shown in this passage, “The face assumed the usual pinched and sunken outline. The lips were of the usual marble pallor. The eyes were lusterless. There was no warmth. Pulsation had ceased. For three days the body was preserved unburied, during which it had acquired a stony rigidity.” page 59 paragraph 2. The descriptive nature of this writing paints a vivid picture that intrigues the reader to use their imagination and visualize the scene presented in the text. This use of imagery ties with aspects of Romanticism because of the nature of the descriptions Poe uses. Describing the physical features of one who seems dead is a horrifying perspective as not many people thing about the aspects of death.
A mutual understanding towards many of Poe’s works is that the loss of a lover brings about insanity, but the truth is that in Poe’s works the loss of a young lover leads to depression. This is a theme that is played out in more than one of Poe’s works, but it is most prevalent in the depressing poem Annabel Lee. The speaker is conflicted with losing what is his whole world and his childhood lover. While all is well with both him and the girl alive, an insurmountable depression takes hold once the winds blow out to carry her to the grave. This is a theme that plays out often in his works and has been observed as one of his main inspirations. Within Peter Coviello’s research, he comes to the conclusion that “Within [Poe’s] world, only very young girls, who are not yet encumbered by the revulsions of adult femininity, seem capable of providing a site for stable heterosexual male desire in Poe.” Rather than using a full fledged adult as his lover, he engineered a child into his poem so the lover does not harness the potential to mutate into a monstros...
Edgar Allan Poe was an excellent horror, suspense, and mystery writer of the eighteenth century. His use of literary devices and different literary techniques makes this writer important to American literature. This paper will show how Edgar Allan Poe has made an impact on Society and American literature as well as how Edgar Allan Poe developed the short story. I will also discuss and analyze some of his works and techniques he uses in his short stories and poems.
Edgar have written numerous poems and stories about death, but some in particular suggest that it was something that reflect upon his childhood. The reason why I said suggest was that we don’t know for sure because Poe never openly stated that, and proven this suggestion. One story, The Masque of the Red Death was about a sickness that was common and deadly during Poe’s life. It had claimed the life of his mother, and his foster mother. Later on it claimed the life of his young bride Virginia Poe who was also his cousin. But the death of his two mothers must have been a significant impact on Poe’s childhood, and the disease, which is tuberculosis, must have struck hatred and fear into the young Poe’s heart. The story (The Masque of the Red Death) was about a red horror that claimed numerous lives, leaving in its wake, a trail of red, bloody destruction. The horror described in thi...
Poe’s frightening stories acts as helpful inspiration for entertainment in the present, and for many years to come. The timeless relevance of his work, and its merciless scrutiny of the human condition, solidifies its place in history and its position of high admiration. In conclusion, the extraordinary-fleeting-tragic life of Edgar Allan Poe will forever remain on record as the tale of an orphan, a gentleman, a soldier, and one of the most prominent literary figures in American history.
Howarth, W. L. (1971). Twentieth century interpretations of Poe's tales; a collection of critical essays.. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.
Thomson, Gary Richard, and Poe Edgar. The selected writings of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Norton & Company, 2004
2. Peeples, Scott. “Life writing/Death writing: Biographical Versions of Poe’s Final Hours.” Biography, 18.4 (1995): 328-338.
Magistrale, Tony. "The Art of Poetry." Student Companion to Edgar Allan Poe. Westport, Conn. ;London: Greenwood, 2001. 39-41. Print.
The story is told through the subjective viewpoint of the narrator who begins by telling the reader he is writing this narrative to unburden his soul because he will die tomorrow. The events that brought him to this place in time have “…terrified, tortured and destroyed him” (Poe). This sets a suspenseful tone for the story. He blames the Fiend Intemperance for the alteration of his personality. He went from a very docile, tenderhearted man who loved his pets and wife to a violent man who inflicted this ill temperament on the very things he loves. The final break from the man that he once was, is the “…spirit of PERVERSENESS” (Poe 514). He describes this as doing something wrong because you know it is wrong. Evil consumes his every thought and he soon develops a hatred for everything. “Speaking through his narrators," Poe illustrates perversit...
For poets, it is essential that they write about what they know and what they feel, as the substance of what they are revealing will enhance their work and ultimately attract audiences. Edgar Allan Poe is one poet whose personal endeavours can be extracted from his poems. His works such as The Raven, Annabel-Lee and Ulalume are just a few of his most celebrated poems that reflect diverse aspects of Poe’s own life. Poe’s reoccurring themes of death in conjunction with love, the subconsciousness of self and ambiguity attracted audiences to become entranced in his work (Spark Notes, 2014). Adjacent to these intriguing themes is how Poe’s personal life was inexplicitly perceived in his poems, in particular The Raven. Poe’s life is reflected through
Redfield, J. S. "The Genius of Poe." Foreword. The Works of Edgar Allan Poe. Ed. A.C. Armstrong & Son. New York: A.C. Armstrong & Son., 1884. xv-xxvi. EPUB file.
Poe is known for his melodramatic writing style, but the constant repetition of daunting words is enough to make any reader practically say out loud, “Come on, Poe. Try to be a little subtle, please.”
Weber, Jean-Paul. "Edgar Poe or The Theme of the Clock." Poe: A Collection of Critical Essays. ED. Robert Regan. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1967. 79-97.