Allan Poe, Edgar - Life and way of writing

Edgar Allan Poe - life and way of writing

Edgar Allan Poe was born in ​Boston​ in 1809. He was the son of ​poor actors​: his father left his family and his mother died, so he was brought up by the ​Allans​, a childless couple. But he gave ​a lot of problems​ to this family, in fact he went to the university in Boston (the family supported him financially), but then he decided to go to England and then back to the United States again.
Then he abandoned everything and his stepfather helped him enter the ​military academy of West Point​ but he remained there only seven months.
He had a lot of women, and he fell in love with his cousin ​Virginia​. They married in 1836, when Virginia was only 13 years old and he was 27.​ ​(he has also been accused because of his interests towards this little cousin)​.
Virginia died in 1847 and Poe’s health declined rapidly owing to his ​alcoholism. In fact, his life was characterized by a strong ​addiction to alcohol​, he was accused of ​perversion​ and ​drug addiction​. Moreover he ran also into debt by ​gambling​.
Because of his ​weird life​ ​he was not considered because a lot of people were against him, only french writers and poets, (Baudelaire, Mallarmé) reevaluated him because of his way of writing.

The way of writing

Edgar Allan Poe is an ​American writer​.
From the literal point of view he was strongly influenced by ​european culture​ (​in fact american literature is a step back ​towards the european literature​).
All american writers looked at Europe as a model to be inspired​, and in particular Edgar Allan Poe was strongly influenced by the english romantic movement, and within the romantic movement he was influenced by the gothic novels.
He is also known as a ​thriller writer​, but he is different from the other thriller writers because his thriller is a ​psychological thriller.
Edgar Allan Poe is famous also for having written remarkable ​Short stories.
These stories were made up of 2 pages, this because he believed in what he called ​“​The single effect”​: He believed that the reader should start reading a short story, and should also finish reading it without standing up from the chair.
He focuses on a ​single episode​, and he believes that the story should be read in maximum two hours, so the first principle was ​brevity.
He was interested in ​what was happening within the soul​, he believed that men were made up of:
•intellect​, that was concerned with ​truth​;
•conscience​, that was concerned with ​duty​;
•soul​, that was concerned with ​beauty.
For his ​idea of beauty​, Poe was considered a kind of ​forerunner of Oscar Wilde​:
Oscar Wilde believed that art should evoke emotions, state of minds, sensations without any moral teaching, and Edgar Allan Poe anticipates this.
In Poe and Oscar Wilde ​there is no moral teaching​, ​so you should appreciate art for what it gives you​, so the most important thing are the immediate feelings that have nothing to do with moral teachings.
Poe’s life ​is storn between ​rationality​ and ​imagination​.
There is always an alternation between hope and despair; Poe wanted love but he lost all the women he loved, because they abandoned him due to his alcoholism. So, his life is always in the middle of two different positions.
The explanation to this alternation can be found in the word “​Madness​”​ (that is one of the topics of his short stories). So the ​theme of duality​, ​double​ and the ​splitting of personality ​are very important.