Edgar Allan Poe Biography That Horror Fans Will 'Fall' In Love With

The art of writing is one that goes into the far depths of history and has been the bane of many and the strength of a few.

One of those few people is Edgar Allan Poe. The writer of 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' and many other horror stories had humble beginnings and a fascinating life story.

The manner in which Poe would write has been described as a two-pronged approach. The first prong is aimed at establishing and creating a sense of unity between his work and the reader.

Doing this must be accidental or left to sudden bursts of inspiration. It must be planned meticulously. Every single detail must be calculated, noted, and understood while creating this effect.

The second prong requires the work to create a feeling of beauty within the writing, through emotions such as sadness or loss. These two prongs, working in tandem, bring forth the writing that made Poe the father of the modern detective story.

Early Life And Family

The beginning of life for this American writer is an interesting tale.

Edgar Allan Poe came into this world on January 19, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts. The tale of Poe has an unfortunate beginning. His birth parents, Eliza and David Poe were both actors. Unfortunately for Poe, he would lose both of them at the mere age of three.

His parents, Frances Allan and John Allan, were his foster parents. It is interesting to know that while John Allan was indeed his foster parent, he never formally adopted Poe, meaning that legally, Poe was not the son of John Allan.

Despite this fact, Edgar Allan Poe would receive a fine education early on in his life. This would be the beginning of an author who would change the face of not only American literature but world literature.

Allan Poe did go to the University of Virginia, and while he did indeed excel academically, he would leave the university after a year. This was due to the massive gambling debts that he had built up. He had alienated himself from his rich family, and John Allan refused to pay back these debts.

This would be the beginning of all of Poe's works. He would begin working on minor poems. These poems were meant to serve as a way to pay back his debts. While this poetry collection would not serve its purpose, it would be the beginning of Poe's life in literature.

Since writing poems would not provide as much money for Poe, he decided to enlist in the army. His stint in the army lasted for 13 months, and he had originally enlisted as Edgar Allan Perry.

Poe then moved on to West Point. Interestingly enough, despite the fact that Poe was relatively well in academics, the appointment at West Point only occurred due to the involvement of his foster father, John Allan.

Editor, Critic, Poet And Writer

The life of Edgar Allan Poe is one that has had a large impact on the world of literature.

One of the major forays that Poe would make into the world of literature would see him work as a literary critic and a magazine editor. Poe was made famous for his works, essays that would almost reach a thousand in number, ranging from reviews, columns, and articles that would appear in different forms of media.

Understanding his own writing, and making interpretations are what led to Poe being a fine critic.

He was one of the few who stood at the precipice of what would go on to be the art of critiquing literature. In fact, Poe would become one of the first people who would go on to create a unified set of standards for how different pieces of literature should be judged.

Additionally, he read the works of historic writers such as Plato, Coleridge, Milton, and many others in order to understand what lies at the heart of good writing.

His bid to create a unified standard of judging literature was aimed at improving the level at which American literature at the time stood. Poe aimed to identify the essentially poor writing.

Poe demanded that American writers meet a higher standard of writing. In order to achieve this, when he critiqued works, he would go on to add detailed technical explanations to understand what went wrong.

He would highlight grammatical errors, which would in turn show the lack of logical reasoning in the writing. The root belief in the approach of Poe was the fact that only the quality of the writing mattered. Things like the writer's background were deemed irrelevant. The approach that Poe would adopt was called harsh by a lot of people.

House And Museum

The place where Edgar Allan Poe lived is a historic location and has been made into a museum for amateur writers and other people to look at!

The home that Poe lived in is located in Baltimore, Maryland, and is a beautiful brick house. It was first rented by Poe's aunt, Maria Clemm.

Her mother, Elizabeth Poe, moved in here. Later on in his life, Edgar Allan Poe moved in the house his aunt lived in with his own family. This would be his next stop after he left West Point.

The old brick house would become the writer's museum first in 1949. In October 2012, the funding for the museum was cut off, and what had been a form of shrine to the amazing author was at the risk of being shut down.

Fortunately, in 2013, a new non-profit organization was established in order to support the continual running of the museum.

The Poe Baltimore aims to protect, survive, and uphold the legacy of the writer who shaped the future of literature in America, and any piece of writing that was worked on. It is the legacy of critiquing work that was adopted by many writers and critics in the future.

Poe's Literary Career

Edgar Allan Poe's literary career is one of the most vivid in history.

The immense works of Poe's literary career contain different short stories, poems, forays into science fiction, as well as detective fiction. He would go on to influence the French Symbolists through his work.

The essential thing to understand about what made Poe one of the greatest writers of his time is the two sides of how he would treat writing.

His two sides were built upon the fact that he was not only a writer but also a critic. Through this method, he could improve his writing in a way that was not really used before.

In his bid to perfect and create a unified set of standards by which he and other critics could judge works in a more standardized manner, Poe was able to master the very art of writing.

Famous Works

Here are some of the famous works of Edgar Allen Poe, including short stories and a prose poem or two!

The first pieces of work that Poe came up with were 'Tamerlane', and 'Other Poems'. 'Tamerlane', and 'Other Poems' did not receive as much recognition but are known because of being one of the first works that Poe started working on to pay back his debts.

Poe's first full-length work is 'Arthur Gordon Pym'. The book is named after the protagonist, who is a stowaway on a whaling ship, the 'Grampus'.

Another one of the most famous works is 'The Black Cat', which tells the story of the relationship between a man and his pet cat. Other famous works of Poe include the supernatural horror 'William Wilson', and 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue'.