Edgar Allen Poe

The darkness that seems to surround Poe's life began as an infant. Poe was born January 19, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts. He was the second son of David and Eliza Poe, but soon after he was born, David abandoned the family. Then two years after that occurrence, Eliza died from tuberculosis. After her death, Edgar, his little sister, Rosalie, and his brother, William, were separated. While William was sent to live with his grandparents, and Rosalie was sent to a family in Richmond, Virginia, Poe moved to live with John and Fannie Allan (Alexander 15). John Allan was a well-known businessman, and Poe was no longer surrounded by poverty. John made sure that Poe was given a good education, and when living in England with the Allans, he went to private academies. He then moved back to the states, where Poe enrolled at the University of Virginia in 1826. When he was there, he spent much of his money, and soon found himself in debt. He asked Mr. Allan to pay for it, but he refused, because he assumed that the debt was due to Poe's constant gambling and consumption of alcohol (Alexander 38). After returning to Mr. Allan when his wife died, John assisted Poe in entering West Point. It can be assumed that the greatest contributor to Poe's disturbance was his addiction to alcohol. His foster family's status made this problem a shameful vise, and a source of conflict.

Poe used drinking as an escape of sorts, and his life was greatly affected by the substance. It disrupted his writing, his first engagement, and his relationship with his foster family. After he left home, he tried to make a life for himself in Boston. He was reunited with his brother, but at the young age of 24 he died, which upset Poe very much. His writing became more insistent after being rejected constantly by newspapers. Soon afterwards, in his mid-twenties, Poe began to think of marriage. He found himself strongly attracted to his 13 year old cousin, Virginia Clemm, and married her. His poem To My Mother was really written to his aunt and mother-in-law, Mrs. Maria Clemm. He was known to be a loving husband to his cousin of 13 (Fisher 23). In 1837, he moved to New York, where he competed with some of the best contemporary writers of that time. Just when his life and writing seemed to be becoming consistent and somewhat stable, his wife died of tuberculosis, and this highly disrupted Poe. His writing instantly became dark and dreary, but he used this tragedy of losing his wife as inspiration to write about death, love, and reunion. His audience continued to grow, and people began to notice it. But it was not until after his death on October 7, 1849 that his writing was given the recognition that it deserved (Ehrlich 14).

Edgar Allen Poe's contributions to American literature have become increasingly more prominent as the years have passed since is death. As short fiction has become a more accepted genre in literary circles, Poe's theories are studied with more passion. Although he lived a rather melancholy life, Poe did experience moments of joy, and desired to capture beauty through poetic form. Indeed, what he left behind for the literary world was his works of genius, revealed through his poetry, fiction, and criticism.

Some people think that some of Poe's criticism has endured more than his short fiction and poetry. Carlson writes, "There have been strongly divergent evaluations of Poe's literary significance, from Emerson's dismissal of him as the 'the jingle man' and Lowell's 'three-fifths genus and two fifths, sheer fudge' to Yeat's declaration, 'always and for all the lands a great lyric poet" (21). The criticism of his poetry and writing was a direct criticism on his theories, seeing as how he implemented his theories in all of his writing. For example, Poe believed that length was extremely important. Poe once wrote that, "If any literary work is too long to read at one sitting, we must be content to dispense with the immensely important effect derivable from unity of impression- for, if two sittings is required, the affairs of the world interfere, and like everything like totality is at once destroyed" (Meyers 129). Thus, length was the very key to enjoyment of a poem or a short story. Unity was also very important in Poe's writing. As Jeffrey Meyers explains, "The single unifying factor in all of Poe's works is the concept of unity itself"(11). He was very concerned with the relationship of words and their effect on the reader. Poe drove himself to create a dream world, one self-contained within writing itself, without the help of external forces. He did this because he did not want his writing to be dependent

on any outside variable.

Now that short fiction and poetry have become an accepted genre, Poe's theories have become even more important. When creating, Poe believed, that one should use an inverse approach to writing. He thought that the writer should have one "single effect", which motivated the entire piece of literature. He thought that the best approach to this would be by coming up with an ending first, and then go about finding the means in which to achieve it. He once stated that, "A skillful literary artist has constructed a tale. If wise, he has not fashioned his thoughts to accommodate his incidents: but having conceived, with deliberate care, a certain unique or single effect to be wrought out, he then inverts such incidents- he then combines such events as may best aid him in establishing this preconceived effect" (May 124).

Poe's poetry uses a theme that appears to deal primarily with his fear of loss, not of himself, but of loved ones. In many of the verses, he refuses to deny the finality of death, because he sees a perpetuation of life in the remembrance of those departed. In effect, death simply becomes a barrier that only temporarily separates the grieving survivor from the more fortunate departed. In his poem "Spirits of the Dead", Poe appears to bemoan the idea that in life only the most delicate bond holds the soul to earthly existence and that the nature of that existence is one of isolation (Fisher 42). Another example expressed in one of his sonnets, Silence, Poe expresses his feelings of isolation by saying that "one dwells in lonely places", while welcoming death or eternity. Therefore, the greatest intimacy possible, while living, is the physical intimacy from love of the heart. In death, the barrier is overcome and the soul is freed from this earthly isolation. Then, and only then can the supreme intimacy be fulfilled with the loved one, soul to soul, for eternity. As Poe clearly spelled out in his poem "Annabel Lee"... "And neither the angels in Heaven above Nor the demons down under the sea,