The Tragedy of Edgar Allen Poe
Edgar Allan Poe is one of the leading figures of American literature. He is known as a poet and a critic, but is most famous as the first master of the short story form, especially tales of the mysterious and gruesome. In Poe's poems, like his tales, his characters are tortured by nameless fears and longings. Today Poe is acclaimed as one of America's greatest writers, but in his own unhappy lifetime he knew little but failure.Poe had an unstable family life. The insecure place he held at home interfered with his emotional stability. He was born as the son of actors. "The two were not notably talented; they played minor roles in third-rate theatrical companies." (Buranalli 7) Between them they barely managed to make a living. Poe was the second of their three children. About the time the third child was born, the father died, or disappeared, and Mrs. Poe went to Richmond, Virginia with the two youngest children. The oldest child, William Henry, had been left in the care of his grandparents in Baltimore shortly after his birth. Mrs. Poe was overtaken by a fatal illness (tuberculosis). Devastated by the disease and worn out with the struggle to support her children, she died. Edgar, two years old, and the infant, Ros
"Poe himself often read it to groups, with the lamps turned down until the room was almost dark, while his voice took on an appropriately eerie tone. Barret Shelton, were pressed upon her, and she was finally sent away for a while into safekeeping. Allan thought the little son of actor parents was a questionable person to inherit his name and the fortune he was busy accumulating. A contract for a Monthly feature set him to writing some of his stories of horror and the supernatural. She lived on a nearby street, so he visited he often. His childish tantrums and his hostile verbal attacks offended the very persons who could have helped him most in his career. He slept with many women in a vain attempt to find comfort for the loss of his wife. Allan had from time to time engaged in extra-marital relations. Poe's love life was just as depressing as his professional and family lives were. "He handled the situation by reminding the boy of his 'disreputable' parentage; he reproached him for lack of 'gratitude' for his home. He was dismissed from the Messenger for intoxication, taken back, and again dismissed for the same reason. Nevertheless, his reputation brought him little money, and the family remained desperately poor. Allan's pride and thrift could not tolerate such conduct.
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