Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, editor and critic and one of the leaders of the American Romantics. He is best known for his tales of the macabre and his poems, as well as being one of the early practitioners of the short story and a progenitor of Gothic and Detective fiction (Crime fiction) in the United States.

Legacy and lore

Poe's works have had a broad influence on American and World literature (sometimes even despite those who tried to resist it), and even on the art world beyond literature. Along with Mary Shelley, Poe is regarded as the foremost proponent of the Gothic strain in literary Romanticism. The scope of Poe's impact on art is evident when one sees the many and diverse artists who were directly and profoundly influenced by him.

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Death, decay and madness were an obsession for Poe. His curious and often nightmarish work greatly influenced the horror and fantasy genres, and the horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft claimed to have been profoundly influenced by Poe's works. He is also credited with originating the genre of detective fiction with his three stories about Auguste Dupin, the most famous of which is "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." (Poe also wrote a satirical detective story called "Thou Art the Man") There is no doubt that he inspired mystery writers who came after him, particularly Arthur Conan Doyle in his series of stories featuring Sherlock Holmes. Doyle was once quoted as saying, "Each is a root from which a whole literature has developed.... Where was the detective story until Poe breathed the breath of life into it?" (Poe Encyclopaedia 103). Poe also profoundly influenced the development of early science fiction author Jules Verne, who discussed Poe in his essay Poe et ses œuvres and also wrote a sequel to Poe's novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket called The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, Le sphinx des glaces (Poe Encyclopaedia 364). H. G. Wells, in discussing the construction of his classics of science fiction, The War of the Worlds and The First Men in the Moon, noted that "Pym tells what a very intelligent mind could imagine about the south polar region a century ago" (Poe Encyclopaedia 372). Ray Bradbury has also professed a love for Poe. He often draws upon Poe in his stories, often mentioning him by name. Another writer profoundly influenced by Poe is Detroit-born horror author Thomas Ligotti; His unconventional characters, desolate locations, and morbid outlook have distinct shades of both Poe and an early Lovecraft.

Related Topics:
Death - Horror - Fantasy - H. P. Lovecraft - Detective fiction - Auguste Dupin - The Murders in the Rue Morgue - Satirical - "Thou Art the Man" - Arthur Conan Doyle - Sherlock Holmes - Science fiction - Jules Verne - H. G. Wells - Ray Bradbury - Detroit - Thomas Ligotti

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Eureka, an essay written in 1848, included a cosmological theory that anticipated the Big Bang theory by eighty years, as well as the first plausible solution to Olbers' paradox. Though described as a "prose poem" by Poe, who wished it to be considered as art, this work is a remarkable scientific and mystical essay unlike any of his other works. He wrote what he considered as his career masterpiece.

Related Topics:
1848 - Big Bang - Olbers' paradox

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Poe had an interest in the field of cryptography. In particular he placed a notice of his abilities in the Philadelphia paper Alexander's Weekly (Express) Messenger, inviting submissions of ciphers, which he proceeded to solve. His success created a public stir for some months. He later wrote an essay on methods of cryptography which proved useful in deciphering the German codes employed during World War I.

Related Topics:
Cryptography - Philadelphia - Cipher - German - World War I

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Poe's literary reputation was greater abroad than it was in the United States, perhaps as a result of America's general revulsion towards the macabre. Rufus Griswold's defamatory reminiscences did little to commend Poe to U.S. literary society. However, American authors as diverse as Walt Whitman, H. P. Lovecraft, William Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor (who, however, claimed the influence of Poe on her works was "something I'd rather not think about" (Poe Encyclopaedia 259)), and Herman Melville were influenced by Poe's works. T. S. Eliot, who was quite hostile to Poe, conceded that "it is impossible, however, to know if even one's own works were not influenced by his."

Related Topics:
Rufus Griswold - Walt Whitman - H. P. Lovecraft - William Faulkner - Flannery O'Connor - Herman Melville - T. S. Eliot

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In France, where he is commonly known as "Edgar Poe," Charles Baudelaire translated his stories and several of the poems into French. Baudelaire was the right man for this job, and his excellent translations meant that Poe enjoyed a vogue among avant-garde writers in France while being ignored in his native land. From France, writers like Algernon Swinburne caught the Poe-bug, and Swinburne's musical verse owes much to Poe's technique. Poe was much admired, also, by the school of Symbolism, and Stéphane Mallarmé dedicated several poems to him. The subsequent authors Paul Valéry and Marcel Proust were great admirers of Poe, the latter saying "Poe sought to arrive at the beautiful through evocation and an elimination of moral motives in his art."

Related Topics:
France - Charles Baudelaire - Avant-garde - Algernon Swinburne - Symbolism - Stéphane Mallarmé - Paul Valéry - Marcel Proust

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Poe's poetry was translated into Russian by the Symbolist poet Konstantin Bal'mont and enjoyed great popularity there in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, influencing artists such as Nabokov, who makes several references to Poe's work in his most famous novel, Lolita. Fyodor Dostoevsky called Poe "an enormously talented writer" and many of his characters, such as Raskolnikov and Porfiry Petrovich in Crime and Punishment are derived from Poe characters (in this case, Montresor from "The Cask of Amontillado" (this is debatable: Raskolnikov is constantly in doubt and trying to justify his actions to himself, while the chilling effect of Montresor's narration lies precisely in the character's calm certainty of his purpose) and Auguste Dupin from "Murders in the Rue Morgue") (Poe Encyclopaedia 102). He wrote favorable reviews of Poe's detective stories and briefly references "The Raven" in his greatest novel, The Brothers Karamazov. Poe influenced the Swedish poet and author Viktor Rydberg, who translated a considerable amount of Poe's work into Swedish.

Related Topics:
Nabokov - Lolita - Fyodor Dostoevsky - Crime and Punishment - The Cask of Amontillado - Auguste Dupin - The Raven - The Brothers Karamazov - Swedish - Viktor Rydberg - Swedish

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A Japanese author even took a pseudonym, Edogawa Rampo, from a rendering of Poe's name in that language.

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Franz Kafka once said of Poe, "He was a poor devil who had no defenses against the world. So he fled into drunkenness. Imagination served him only as a crutch. He wrote tales of mystery to make himself at home in the world. That's perfectly natural. Imagination has fewer pitfalls than reality...I know his way of escape and his dreamer's face." Poe made a deep impression on Kafka and the influence of Poe's works on his are undeniable.

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Jorge Luis Borges was a great admirer of Poe's works, and translated his stories into Spanish. Many of the characters from Borges' stories are borrowed directly from Poe's stories, and in many of his stories Poe is mentioned by name.

Related Topics:
Jorge Luis Borges - Spanish

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In Thomas Mann's novel Buddenbrooks, a character reads Poe's short novels and professes to be influenced by his works.

Related Topics:
Thomas Mann - Buddenbrooks

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In the music world, Joseph Holbrooke, Claude Debussy and Sergei Rachmaninoff composed musical works based on the works of Poe. Holbrooke composed a symphonic poem based on The Raven. Debussy often declared Poe's profound effect on his music (Poe Encyclopedia 93) and began operas based on The Fall of the House of Usher and The Devil in the Belfry, though he did not finish them. Rachmaninoff transformed "The Bells" into a choral symphony. (Three other orchestral works based on Poe, along with the Rachmaninoff, were featured in a concert given by the American Symphony Orchestra in October 1999 {{ref|music}}.) In the world of visual arts, Gustave Doré and Édouard Manet composed several illustrations for Poe's works. On the stage, the great dramatist George Bernard Shaw was greatly influenced by Poe's literary criticism, calling Poe "the greatest journalistic critic of his time" (Poe Encyclopaedia 315). Oscar Wilde called Poe "this marvellous lord of rhythmic expression" and drew on Poe's works for his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray and his short stories (Poe Encyclopedia 375). Alfred Hitchcock declared Poe as one of his inspirations, saying "It's because I liked Edgar Allan Poe's stories so much that I began to make suspense films."

Related Topics:
Joseph Holbrooke - Claude Debussy - Sergei Rachmaninoff - Symphonic poem - The Devil in the Belfry - The Bells - Gustave Doré - Édouard Manet - George Bernard Shaw - Oscar Wilde - The Picture of Dorian Gray - Alfred Hitchcock

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In recent years the poet and critic W. H. Auden has revitalized interest in Poe's works, especially his critical works. Auden said of Poe, "His portraits of abnormal or self-destructive states contributed much to Dostoyevsky, his ratiocinating hero is the ancestor of Sherlock Holmes and his many successors, his tales of the future lead to H. G. Wells, his adventure stories to Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson." (Poe Encyclopaedia 27).

Related Topics:
W. H. Auden - Robert Louis Stevenson

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The Mystery Writers of America have named their awards for excellence in the genre the "Edgars."

Related Topics:
Mystery Writers of America - Edgars

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Even though Poe spent less than two years in the city, Baltimoreans have treated the author as a native son. Many business establishments have used Poe as a theme for their marketing.

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In 1996, when the original Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore, they were rechristened "the Baltimore Ravens", in honor of his best known tale. The team even created three "winged" mascots - naturally they named them Edgar, Allan, and Poe.

Related Topics:
1996 - Cleveland Browns - "the Baltimore Ravens" - Mascots

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Poe's image, with his weary expression, piercing eyes and tangled hair (see the daguerrotype above), has become a cultural icon for the troubled genius. His face adorns the bottlecaps of Raven Beer {{ref|beer}}, the covers of numerous books on American literature as a whole, and is often stereotyped in cartoons as "the creepy guy". {{ref|camb}} In 1967, Poe appeared as part of the backdrop crowd of the Beatles' immensely popular album, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band.

Related Topics:
Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band

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Preserved home

Edgar Allan Poe, his wife Virginia, and his mother-in-law Maria rented several homes in Philadelphia, but only the last house has survived.

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That Spring Garden home (where the author lived in 1843-44) is today preserved by the National Park Service as a memorial to one of our most influential and fascinating American authors.

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