Poems By Edgar Allan Poe example essay topic

Edgar Allan Poe 1809-1849 In personal appearance, Poe was a quiet, shy-looking but handsome man; he was slightly built, and was five feet, eight inches in height. His mouth was considered beautiful. His eyes, with long dark lashes, were hazel-gray. Edgar Poe was born in 1809 in Boston.

It was in Richmond that Poe grew up, married, and first gained a national literary reputation. Many of the places in Richmond associated with Poe have been lost, but several still remain. Family Father: David Poe, an actor Mother: Elizabeth Poe, an actress Foster parents: John Allan, Tobacco merchant and his wife, Frances Allan, cared for Poe while he was young, but never legally adopted him. Wife: Poe married his cousin Virginia Clemm Occupation so Soldier o Editor and literary critic o Author Chronology Edgar Poe is the second of the three children of David Poe and Elizabeth (Arnold) Poe, both of whom were professional actors and members of a touring theatrical company.

Mr. Placide's Theatre Company in Boston employed Poe's natural parents, David and Elizabeth Arnold Poe. They had been married in Richmond while on tour in 1806. Edgar Allan Poe was born January 19, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts, but he considered Richmond his home, and called himself 'a Virginian,' where his mother had been employed as an actress. David Poe, unknown due to his more famous wife, his own promising career ruined by alcoholism, Edgar's father, deserted the family when Edgar was still an infant; nothing conclusive is known of his life thereafter. While appearing professionally in Richmond, Virginia, Poe's mother became ill and died on December 8, 1811, in Richmond at the age of twenty-four. Poe's mother, Elizabeth, was buried in the churchyard of St. John's Episcopal Church where her memorial stone may be seen.

St. John's is the oldest church in Richmond and is famous as the site of Patrick Henry's rousing 'liberty or death' oration shortly before the Revolutionary War. The Richmond Theatre where Edgar Poe's mother had performed burned to the ground on December 26, 1811, only eighteen days after her death. The fire took the lives of many Richmond ers including the Governor of Virginia, George Smith and his wife. At the site of the tragedy on East Broad Street, Monumental Episcopal Church was erected as a memorial to the victims. Her three children, who would maintain contact with one another throughout their lives, were sent to live with different foster families.

Richmond families took in the other two children who were Rosalie, only eleven months old, by William and Jane Scott Mackenzie. Edgar, not quite three, was taken into the family of tobacco-merchants. John Allan was a member of the firm of Ellis and Allan. John Allan, and his wife Frances, had no children of their own... At this time, Allan and his wife were living in quarters located above the firm's offices at Thirteenth and East Main Streets. The following year Edgar was baptized at the Monumental Episcopal Church on January 7, 1812 by the Reverend John Buchanan, with John and Frances Allan as his godparents.

Francis and Edgar regularly attended services and maintained pew number 80 in the church. John Allan, raised as a Scotch Presbyterian, may have visited from time to time, if only for maintaining business contacts in the community. In 1815, business reasons led Allan to move to England for a five-year stay. While in London and back in Richmond after the family's return, Poe was well educated in private academies. John Allan bought the house, Moldavia, in 1825, and Edgar lived there before entering the University of Virginia in 1826.

In 1825 at the age of sixteen, Poe became secretly engaged Elmira Royster. The Royster family lived just across the street with their daughter Elmira from Edgar. The engagement, opposed by both families, was eventually broken off. Although Edgar was never formally adopted by the Allan, Poe regarded them, especially Mrs. Allan, as parents.

Poe took their surname as his own middle name. All of the Allan homes where Poe grew up have now disappeared; however, a photograph of, his last home in Richmond, does exist. After returning to Richmond, young Poe registered at the University of Virginia on February 14, 1826. He distinguished himself as a student, but he started drinking. Poe accumulated gambling debts of $2,000, which John Allan, refused to honor. He lived in Room 13, West Range.

He became an active member of the Jefferson Literary Society. By December Poe had passed all of his course with good grades, but due to the debts, Mr. Allan did not approve of and refused to give him enough money for necessary expenses. After Mr. Allan refused to let him return to the University, Poe left Richmond in March 1827 and sailed north to Boston. In Boston is where he published his first book, and a pamphlet called Tamerlane and Other Poems. Even today this is such a rare book a single copy has sold for $200,000.00. The poems reflect his difficulty with his Richmond family, which must have been composed while he was still in Virginia.

While in Boston, Poe enlisted in The United States Army on May 26, 1827 as a private using an assumed name Edgar A. Perry. Poe claimed to be 22 years old, but was actually eighteen. Poe spent two years of service, which he was promoted to the rank of Sergeant Major, a highest noncommissioned rank, he secured, with Mr. Allan's aid, he was honorably discharge from the Army and went on to Baltimore. He desire an appointment to West Point in the hope of becoming a career commissioned officer. While living in Baltimore, Poe published a second book of poetry in 1829: Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor Poems, which attracted little more attention than its previous book. He lived with his aunt, Mrs. Maria Poe Clemm, his father's sister, on the small amounts of money sent by Mr. Allan until he received an appointment to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Frances Allan died in February 1829. John Allan, helped Poe to enter West Point in May of 1830. Mr. Allan remarried in October 1830 and refused to have anything else to do with Poe. Poe found the only method of release from the Academy, and was dismissed on March 6, 1831 by being chafed under the regimen: deliberately missing classes, roll calls, and compulsory chapel attendance. After Poe left West Point, a third volume appeared in 1831: Poems by Edgar Allan Poe, Second Edition, funded through contributions from fellow cadets. Among its contents was "Israfel", and "To Helen,' was inspired by Jane Standard, who was the mother of one Poe's Richmond schoolmates.

Poe referred to her as 'the first, purely ideal love of my soul". Poe moved back to Baltimore where he moved in with his widowed aunt Maria Clemm, his father's sister, who would be the most deeply devoted of his several mother-figures, and her eight-year-old daughter Virginia. It was during this period that he began to achieve wider recognition as a writer. In 1832, he published five writing prose tales in the Philadelphia Saturday Courier. In 1833, he entered a competition sponsored by the Baltimore Saturday Visitor, winning the second prize in poetry for 'The Coliseum' and the first prize in fiction for 'MS. Found in a Bottle. ' In 1834, the publication of 'The Visionary' in Godey's Lady's Book marked the first time that his fiction appeared in a magazine of more than local circulation.

John Allan died 1834, Poe received nothing. Poe was disinherited, unsuited for business or the military, so he turned to journalism, this was the one avenue likely to afford a successful career to someone of his interests and abilities. His success in the contest led to a job opportunity, which brought him back to Richmond in 1835 as an assistant editor on the Southern Literary Messenger to contribute short fiction and book reviews to the Richmond-based magazine. In a period of American literature not notable for them, Poe exhibited obvious creative principles and high critical standards, and within months his vigorous and uncompromising reviews began to increase the Messenger's circulation. The magazine's reputation was enhanced, prompting its publisher to make Poe his principal book reviewer and editorial assistant.

By the end of the year, Poe was named editor in chief. Poe moved to Richmond with Virginia and Mrs. Clemm. While Poe worked at the Southern Literary Messenger from August 1835 to January 1837, he lived at Mrs. Yarrington's boarding house with Mrs. Clemm and Virginia. On May 16, 1836 Poe and his young 13-year-old cousin Virginia were married.

While editing the Southern Literary Messenger, Poe wrote his only novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. The first part of the novel was published in the Messenger in Richmond. Poe also composed the play, Politian in Richmond. He gained recognition as a critic, poet and writer of tales while living in Richmond and editing the magazine. After raising the Messenger's circulation by 700 percent, but he did not get along with his colleagues, Poe leaves and goes to work for Burton's Gentleman's Magazine in Philadelphia. He publishes 'Ligeia,' The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, and other works.

Poe's slashing reviews and sensational tales made him widely known as an author; however, he failed to find a publisher for a volume of burlesque tales, Tales of the Folio Club. Harpers did, however, print his book-length narrative, Arthur Gordon Pym in July of 1838. In January 1837, Poe was dissatisfied both with his salary and with limits on his editorial independence; he resigned from the Southern Literary Messenger. Poe left the Messenger hoping to start his own literary journal. Little is known about Poe's life after he left the Messenger; however, in 1838 he went to Philadelphia where he lived for six years.

Struggling to support Virginia and Mrs. Clemm through freelance writing, he moved his family first to New York and then to Philadelphia as he sought another editorial position. Despite financial difficulties, Poe was able in this period to advance his own writing career, publishing reviews, poems, and especially fiction in various journals and in several volumes. Again, the North beckoned as the most propitious place for such an undertaking. He moved to Philadelphia and then to New York, making his living by editorial work on such publications as he began to write regularly for Burton's Gentleman's Magazine in July 1839 to June 1840, contributing a feature article and a number of book reviews each month.

Once again, Poe's editorship brought dramatic advances in both quality and circulation, but he was dismissed from this position in June 1840 after once again quarreling with his publisher. In 1840, Poe's Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque a book of previously published stories, including 'William Wilson' and 'The Fall of the House of Usher. ' was published in two volumes in Philadelphia Graham's Magazine from April, 1841 to May, 1842. Poe's failing in attempts to fund his own journal, in 1841 Poe became an editor of Graham's Magazine in Philadelphia from 1841-1842, a new journal formed by George Graham through a merger of his magazine The Casket with the Gentleman's Magazine, which he had bought from Burton. Once more the pattern played itself out: the magazine thrived under Poe's direction, he wanted a higher salary and a freer editorial hand, and he left his position -- although this time on relatively good terms with the publisher.

Poe's personal fortunes once more suffered reverses as his writing career advanced. In January 1842, Virginia suddenly began to hemorrhage from the mouth, the first indication that she had contracted tuberculosis. She was seriously ill for a time, and would never again be truly healthy. Poe also had renewed difficulties in his attempts to find steady employment. In 1843 he published several works, including 'The Tell-Tale Heart,' in James Russell Lowell's short-lived journal The Pioneer, and in June of that year his story 'The Gold-Bug' won a $100 prize in a contest sponsored by the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper.

Widely reprinted, it made Poe famous with a broad fiction-reading public, but he did not become financially secure. Owing to lax copyright standards at the time that allowed for widespread reprinting -- a condition that Poe himself editorialized about -- writers did not profit directly from the popularity of their work. In April, 1844, with barely car fare for his family of three, including his aunt, Virginia's mother where he lectured on American poetry and contributed articles to newspapers and magazines, who lived with them, Poe went to New York where he found work on the New York Evening Mirror and The Broadway Journal. In 1845, Poe became famous with the spectacular success of his poem 'The Raven,' and in March of that year, he joined C.F. Briggs in an effort to publish The Broadway Journal. Also in 1845, Wiley and Putnam publishers issued Tales by Edgar A. Poe and The Raven and Other Poems. The year 1845 would bring both triumphs and the beginning of a final downward spiral in Poe's life.

His poem 'The Raven' appeared in the New York Evening Mirror in January, and was an instant success with both readers and critics. He began writing for the Broadway Journal, became its editor in July, and shortly thereafter fulfilled a longstanding dream by becoming its owner as well. Unfortunately, Poe never succeeded as owner / editor of his own publication. Financial difficulties, his worry over Virginia, and his own precarious physical and emotional state caused him to cease publication of the Broadway Journal after less than six months as its proprietor.

He moved out of New York City to a cottage in then-rural Fordham, where in the midst of poverty, ill health, and Virginia's now grave illness, he still somehow continued to earn a small income writing reviews and articles. A satirical piece on fellow writer Thomas Dunn English provoked from its subject a scurrilous personal attack in the Evening Mirror, which led Poe to sue the publication. Although he would win the suit and collect damages the following year, the whole episode was a great strain upon Poe's already fragile nervous system. The year of 1846 was a tragic one The Broadway Journal failed, and Virginia became very ill. Poe rented the little cottage at Fordham, with Virginia where he lived the last three years of his life. Although ill, he publishes 'The Cask of Amontillado,' 'The Philosophy of Composition,' and other works.

On January 30, 1847, Virginia died of tuberculosis, causing Poe to plunge into an emotional and physical collapse that lasted for most of the year... After his wife's death Poe returned to Richmond briefly in 1848 and again in 1849., In 1848, Poe writes in a letter that he has tried to commit suicide, he was briefly engaged to marry Sarah Helen Whitman, a widowed poet several years his senior, but their relationship was tense and strained, and the engagement was broken off. Poe perhaps yielded more often to a weakness for drink, which had beset him at intervals since early manhood. He was unable to take even a little alcohol without a change of personality, and any excess was accompanied by physical prostration.

Throughout his life those illnesses had interfered with his success as an editor, and had given him a reputation for intemperateness that he scarcely deserved. He went to Richmond in the summer of 1849, hoping to find financial backing for yet another journal, and while there he was reunited with and re-engaged to Elmira Royster Shelton, his first love, now herself a widow. He sailed from Richmond to Baltimore, where on October 3, 1849, he was found outside a polling place (it was election day), in a state of delirium and wearing shabby and ill-fitting clothing. Tradition says that it was at Talavera that Poe gave his last reading of 'The Raven' on September 25, 1849.

Two days later, Poe left Richmond for the last time. He died in Baltimore on October 7, 1849. The circumstances of Poe's death remain a mystery. En route to Philadelphia from Richmond, where he had arranged to marry Sarah Elmira Royster, Poe stops in Baltimore, where he is found unconscious on the street... After a visit to Norfolk and Richmond for lectures, he was found in Baltimore in a pitiable condition and taken unconscious to a hospital where he died on Sunday, October 7, 1849. This is the first verifiable evidence available of Poe's whereabouts since departing Richmond in the early morning of September 27.

His intended destination had been Philadelphia, where he was to edit a volume of poetry for Mrs. St. Leon Loud. Dr. Snodgrass found Poe semiconscious and dressed in cheap, ill-fitting clothes so unlike Poe's usual mode of dress that many believe that Poe's own clothing had been stolen. Poe was taken to Washington College Hospital on the afternoon of October 3 and did not regain consciousness until the next morning. For days he passed from delirium to unconsciousness, but never recovered well enough to tell how he had arrived in such a condition. In the early morning hours of October 7, Poe calmly breathed a simple prayer, 'Lord, help my poor soul,' and died. His cause of death was ascribed to 'congestion of the brain.

' No autopsy was performed, and the author was buried two days later in the yard of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Baltimore, Maryland. In dying under such mysterious circumstances, the father of the detective story has left us with a real-life mystery which Poe scholars, medical professionals, and others have been trying to solve for over 150 years. Whatever mysteries may still surround his life and character, there is no doubt of his enormous importance to American literature in several different areas. His best poems -- 'To Helen,' 'The Raven,' 'Annabel Lee,' and others -- which many can recite by heart, demonstrate him to be a master of rhythmic effect.

His stories, particularly his tales of horror and terror, are equally treasured by an immense readership. Yet despite his popular association with the gothic and the grotesque, Poe was also an accomplished humorist, as shown in a number of his short stories, and was capable of hilarious satire at the expense of inferior writers. More than anyone else in early nineteenth-century America, he played a crucial role in shaping and elevating literary taste and in developing aesthetic theory, particularly in the field of poetry. Thus, both with critics and scholars and with the general public, Poe remains a permanent fixture of our living literary culture. Poe's Works " Al Aaraaf'Romance" Publication: 1829 'The City in the Sea" Publication: 1831 'To Helen' Publication: 1831 'Israfel' Publication: 1831 'MS. Found in a Bottle' Publication: 1833 'Berenice' Publication: 1835 'Morella'Hans Pfaal'Metzengerstein'Shadow' Publication: 1835 'Ligeia' Publication: 1838 'William Wilson' Publication: 1839 'The Fall of the House of Usher' Publication: 1839 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' Publication: 1841 'The Descent into the Maelstrom'The Masque of the Red Death' Publication: 1842 'The Pit and the Pendulum' Publication: 1842 'The Gold-Bug" Publication: 1843 The Tale Tell Heart " The Imp of the Perverse'The Black Cat' Publication: 1843 'The Balloon Hoax" 'The Oblong Box' 'Dream-Land' Publication: 1844 'The Raven' Publication: 1845 'The Philosophy of Composition' Publication: 1846 'The Cask of Amontillado' Publication: 1846 'Ulalume' Publication: 1847 'Hop-Frog' Publication: 1849 Eureka Publication: 1849 'The Bells' Publication: 1849