Edgar Allan Poe: The Gothic Master

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Edgar Allan Poe The Gothic Master!

• Mr. Feraco
• American Literature
• 29 November 2007

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No Great Artist Goes Unpunished

• Poes family history was troubled
• David Poe drank heavily, and abandoned Elizabeth
  Arnold (Edgars mother) shortly after his sons
  birth in 1809
• Elizabeth died in Richmond, VA while Edgar was
  only three years old
• The now-orphaned Edgar was cared for by John and
  Frances Allan
• Poe uses their last name as his middle name

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Father Issues

• Frances was kind to Edgar, but John never
  accepted him as a son
• John was extremely critical of Poes desire to
  become a writer
• Edgar entered the University of Virginia at the
  age of seventeen
• He studied well, but wanted more money than John
  was willing to give him

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Deep in Debt and Running Away

• Edgar turned to gambling as an alternate source
  of income, but the habit left him with large
  debts
• John pulled Edgar out of school once he found out
  (rather than help his ward pay his lenders)
• Edgar responded by running away, and ended up in
  Boston on his own now an orphan by choice

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Lost in Boston

• Poes writing dreams took a hit after the
  publication of his first poetry collection,
  Tamerlane, in 1827
• The work sold poorly
• Edgar joined the military after failing to find
  other work
• He did well enough for himself in the military
  (promoted to sergeant major)
• However, Poe didnt enjoy his new lifestyle, and
  decided to ask John Allan for help

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A Dying Wish

• Frances begged John to help Edgar on her
  deathbed, and her husband relented
• With Johns assistance, Edgar entered the U.S.
  Military Academy at West Point in late 1829
• It would be the last time Allan ever helped his
  foster son
• Edgar probably went to the Academy in order to
  please John
• However, John remarried in 1830 with a woman
  young enough to bear children (thus ensuring Poe
  would not be his heir), and Edgar left the Academy

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Glimmers of Success within the Darkness

• Poe was able to publish El Aaraaf, his second
  collection of poems, while waiting to enter West
  Point
• This collection was more successful than
  Tamerlane, and earned Poe his first real praise
  as a poet
• The books success helped provide a foundation
  for Poe to continue his work

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A Very Strange Marriage

• Poe moved to Baltimore, where his aunt, Maria Poe
  Clemm, took him in
• He married Marias daughter, Virginia, in 1835
  despite the fact that Virginia was thirteen years
  old!
• Not only was Virginia much younger than Poe
  exactly half his age but her health was poor,
  and she required a great deal of care

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Writing to Survive

• Poe worked as an editor at various magazines in
  order to support Virginia and Maria
• He continued writing whenever he could, finishing
  a novel and a number of short stories and poems
  including The Fall of the House of Usher

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Darkness on a Page

• Poes prose is often tense, simultaneously
  breathless, strangled, and claustrophobic -
  despite the presence of ornate descriptions and
  elaborate sentence constructions
• Most of his narrators are terrified or distraught
• Many of his characters suffer from illnesses of
  the body and mind, or carry terrible, haunting
  secrets and characters often go insane or die!
• Poes eerie settings, tragic stories, and
  obsession with loss, death, guilt, and grief
  often shocked and frightened his readers

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Peering into the minds dark corners

• However, Poes psychological thrillers werent
  meant to be exploitative
• Instead, the author wanted to move beyond the
  sunny world of the optimists and the ordered
  world of the rationalists in order to explore a
  greater truth
• He aimed to do this by pulling back the curtain
  that separates the ordinary from the
  supernatural, revealing the truth in the
  darkness that lies within the human mind

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Drowning in a bottle

• Poes writing flourished even as the writer
  suffered
• The author produced a large number of original
  pieces despite a crippling drinking problem
• Although a few sips of alcohol left him
  staggering, Poe drank constantly in order to
  escape a disturbing, tormented world

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Never Enough

• Despite the fact that he wrote fairly often,
  Poes work never left him with enough money to
  support Virginia or Maria comfortably
• Even The Raven, arguably the authors most
  famous work, didnt provide him with the money he
  needed

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The beginning of the End

• Poes life fell apart when Virginia, his
  now-25-year-old wife, died of tuberculosis in
  1847
• He grew more and more unstable, eventually
  developing a brain lesion that signaled his
  impending death
• Desperate, Poe continued to seek romance, looking
  for someone to finally adopt him
• Its sad to realize that Poe spent his entire
  life searching so hard for stability financial,
  familial, emotional only to never find it

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The ugly End

• Poe disappeared in Virginia in 1849 while on his
  way to meet with a woman he hoped to marry
• He was found in a tavern a week later, soaking
  wet and delirious
• Poe died four days later, regaining consciousness
  just long enough to pray, Lord help my poor
  soul.

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The Legacy of a tortured soul

• Poes influence on other writers has been
  tremendous, and continues to this day
• See Stephen King for a contemporary example
• Arthur Conan Doyle was inspired to create
  Sherlock Holmes after reading Poes works
• Fyodor Dostoevsky, a famous Russian writer, was
  driven to examine the criminal mind producing
  such landmarks as Crime and Punishment
• Poe is the forefather of the detective story,
  with short stories such as The Purloined Letter
  providing others with a narrative framework for
  their own stories

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In conclusion

• Poe, our most famous explorer of death, produced
  a body of work that will extend his legacy for
  centuries after his unfortunate death
• He has experienced far more success in death than
  in lifeand, in a strange way, that almost seems
  appropriate.

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