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=                          Edgar_Allan_Poe                           =
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                            Introduction
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Edgar Allan Poe (; January 19, 1809 - October 7, 1849) was an American
writer, poet, editor, and literary critic who is best known for his
poetry and short stories, particularly his tales involving mystery and
the macabre. He is widely regarded as one of the central figures of
Romanticism and Gothic fiction in the United States and of early
American literature. Poe was one of the country's first successful
practitioners of the short story, and is generally considered to be
the inventor of the detective fiction genre. In addition, he is
credited with contributing significantly to the emergence of science
fiction. He is the first well-known American writer to earn a living
exclusively through writing, which resulted in a financially difficult
life and career.

Poe was born in Boston. He was the second child of actors David and
Elizabeth "Eliza" Poe. His father abandoned the family in 1810, and
when Eliza died the following year, Poe was taken in by John and
Frances Allan of Richmond, Virginia. They never formally adopted him,
but he lived with them well into young adulthood. Poe attended the
University of Virginia but left after only a year due to a lack of
money. He frequently quarreled with John Allan over the funds needed
to continue his education as well as his gambling debts. In 1827,
having enlisted in the United States Army under the assumed name of
Edgar A. Perry, he published his first collection, 'Tamerlane and
Other Poems', which was credited only to "a Bostonian". Poe and Allan
reached a temporary rapprochement after the death of Allan's wife,
Frances, in 1829. However, Poe later failed as an officer cadet at
West Point, declared his intention to become a writer, primarily of
poems, and parted ways with Allan.

Poe switched his focus to prose and spent the next several years
working for literary journals and periodicals, becoming known for his
own style of literary criticism. His work forced him to move between
several cities, including Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City.
In 1836, when he was 27, he married his 13-year-old cousin, Virginia
Clemm. She died of tuberculosis in 1847.

In January 1845, he published his poem "The Raven" to instant success.
He planned for years to produce his own journal, 'The Penn', later
renamed 'The Stylus'. But before it began publishing, Poe died in
Baltimore in 1849, aged 40, under mysterious circumstances. The cause
of his death remains unknown and has been attributed to many causes,
including disease, alcoholism, substance abuse, and suicide.

Poe's works influenced the development of literature throughout the
world and even impacted such specialized fields as cosmology and
cryptography. Since his death, he and his writings have appeared
throughout popular culture in such fields as art, photography,
literary allusions, music, motion pictures, and television. Several of
his homes are dedicated museums. In addition, The Mystery Writers of
America presents an annual Edgar Award for distinguished work in the
mystery genre.


                      Early life and education
======================================================================
Edgar Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on January 19, 1809, the
second child of American actor David Poe Jr. and English-born actress
Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe. He had an elder brother, Henry, and a
younger sister, Rosalie. Their grandfather, David Poe, had emigrated
from County Cavan, Ireland, around 1750.

His father abandoned the family in 1810, and his mother died a year
later from pulmonary tuberculosis. Poe was then taken into the home of
John Allan, a successful merchant in Richmond, Virginia, who dealt in
a variety of goods, including cloth, wheat, tombstones, tobacco, and
slaves. The Allans served as a foster family and gave him the name
"Edgar Allan Poe", although they never formally adopted him.

The Allan family had Poe baptized into the Episcopal Church in 1812.
John Allan alternately spoiled and aggressively disciplined his foster
son. The family sailed to the United Kingdom in 1815, and Poe attended
a grammar school for a short period in Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland,
where Allan was born, before rejoining the family in London in 1816.
There he studied at a boarding school in Chelsea until summer 1817. He
was subsequently entered at the Reverend John Bransby's Manor House
School in Stoke Newington, then a suburb 4 mi north of London.

Poe moved to Richmond with the Allans in 1820. In 1824, he served as
the lieutenant of the Richmond youth honor guard as the city
celebrated the visit of the Marquis de Lafayette. In March 1825,
Allan's uncle and business benefactor William Galt died, who was said
to be one of the wealthiest men in Richmond, leaving Allan several
acres of real estate. The inheritance was estimated at $750,000 (). By
summer 1825, Allan celebrated his expansive wealth by purchasing a
two-story brick house called Moldavia.

Poe may have become engaged to Sarah Elmira Royster before he
registered at the University of Virginia in February 1826 to study
ancient and modern languages. The university was in its infancy,
established on the ideals of its founder, Thomas Jefferson. It had
strict rules against gambling, horses, guns, tobacco, and alcohol, but
these rules were mostly ignored. Jefferson enacted a system of student
self-government, allowing students to choose their own studies, make
their own arrangements for boarding, and report all wrongdoing to the
faculty.

The unique system was rather chaotic, and there was a high dropout
rate. During his time there, Poe lost touch with Royster and also
became estranged from his foster father over gambling debts. He
claimed that Allan had not given him sufficient money to register for
classes, purchase texts, or procure and furnish a dormitory. Allan did
send additional money and clothes, but Poe's debts increased. Poe gave
up on the university after a year, but did not feel welcome to return
to Richmond, especially when he learned that his sweetheart, Royster,
had married another man, Alexander Shelton. Instead, he traveled to
Boston in April 1827, sustaining himself with odd jobs as a clerk and
newspaper contributor. Poe started using the pseudonym Henri Le Rennet
during this period.


                          Military career
======================================================================
As Poe was unable to support himself, he decided to enlist in the
United States Army as a private on May 27, 1827, using the name "Edgar
A. Perry". Although he claimed that he was , he was actually 18. He
first served at Fort Independence in Boston Harbor for five dollars a
month. That same year, his first book was published, a 40-page
collection of poetry titled 'Tamerlane and Other Poems', attributed
only to "A Bostonian". 50 copies were printed, and the book received
virtually no attention. Poe's 1st Regiment of Artillery was posted to
Fort Moultrie in Charleston, South Carolina, before embarking on the
brig 'Waltham' on November 8, 1827. Poe was promoted to "artificer",
an enlisted tradesman tasked with preparing shells for artillery. His
monthly pay doubled. Poe served for two years, attaining the rank of
sergeant major for artillery, the highest rank that a non-commissioned
officer could achieve. He then sought to end his five-year enlistment
early.

Poe revealed his real name and his actual circumstances to his
commanding officer, Lieutenant Howard, who promised to allow Poe to be
honorably discharged if he reconciled with Allan. Poe then wrote a
letter to Allan, who was unsympathetic and spent several months
ignoring Poe's pleas. Allan may not have written to Poe to inform him
of his foster mother's illness. Frances Allan died on February 28,
1829. Poe visited the day after her burial. Perhaps softened by his
wife's death, Allan agreed to support Poe's desire to receive an
appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New
York.

Poe was finally discharged on April 15, 1829, after securing a
replacement to finish his enlistment. Before entering West Point, he
moved to Baltimore, where he stayed with his widowed aunt, Maria
Clemm, her daughter Virginia Eliza Clemm (Poe's first cousin), his
brother Henry, and his invalid grandmother Elizabeth Cairnes Poe. That
September, Poe received "the very first words of encouragement I ever
remember to have heard" in a review of his poetry by influential
critic John Neal, which prompted Poe to dedicate one of the poems to
Neal in his second book, 'Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane and Minor Poems',
published in Baltimore in 1829.

Poe traveled to West Point and matriculated as a cadet on July 1,
1830. In October 1830, Allan married his second wife Louisa Patterson.
This marriage and the bitter quarrels with Poe over children born to
Allan out of extramarital affairs led to the foster father finally
disowning Poe. Poe then decided to leave West Point by intentionally
getting court-martialed. On February 8, 1831, he was tried for gross
neglect of duty and disobedience of orders for refusing to attend
formations, classes, and church. Knowing he would be found guilty, Poe
pleaded not guilty to the charges in order to induce dismissal.

Poe left for New York in February 1831 and then released a third
volume of poems, simply titled, 'Poems'. The book was financed with
help from his fellow cadets at West Point, some of whom donated as
much as 75 cents to the cause. The total raised was approximately
$170. They may have been expecting verses similar to the satirical
ones Poe had written about commanding officers in the past. The book
was printed by Elam Bliss of New York, labeled as "Second Edition",
and included a page saying, "To the U.S. Corps of Cadets this volume
is respectfully dedicated". It once again reprinted the somewhat
lengthy poems, "Tamerlane", and "Al Araaf", while also including six
previously unpublished poems, conspicuous among which are, "To Helen",
and "The City in the Sea". Poe returned to Baltimore and to his aunt,
brother, and cousin in March 1831. His elder brother Henry had been
seriously ill for some time, in part due to complications resulting
from alcoholism, and he died on August 1, 1831.


                         Publishing career
======================================================================
After his brother's death, Poe's earnest attempts to make a living as
a writer were mostly unsuccessful. However, he eventually managed to
earn a living by his pen alone, becoming one of the first American
authors to do so. His efforts were initially hampered by the lack of
an international copyright law. American publishers often chose to
sell unauthorized copies of works by British authors rather than pay
for new work written by Americans, regardless of merit. The initially
anemic reception of Edgar Allan Poe's work may also have been
influenced by the Panic of 1837.

There was a booming growth in American periodicals around this time,
fueled in part by new technology, but many did not last beyond a few
issues. Publishers often refused to pay their writers or paid them
much later than they promised, and Poe repeatedly resorted to
humiliating pleas for money and other assistance.After his early
attempts at poetry, Poe turned his attention to prose, perhaps based
on John Neal's critiques in 'The Yankee' magazine. He placed a few
stories with a Philadelphia publication and began work on his only
drama, 'Politian'. The 'Baltimore Saturday Visiter' awarded him a
prize in October 1833 for his often overlooked short story "MS. Found
in a Bottle". The tale brought him to the attention of John P.
Kennedy, a Baltimorean of considerable means who helped Poe place some
of his other stories and introduced him to Thomas W. White, editor of
the 'Southern Literary Messenger' in Richmond.

In 1835, Poe became assistant editor of the 'Southern Literary
Messenger', but White discharged him within a few weeks, allegedly for
being drunk on the job. Poe then returned to Baltimore, where he
obtained a license to marry his cousin Virginia on September 22, 1835,
though it is unknown if they were actually married at that time. He
was 26 and she was 13.

Poe was reinstated by White after promising to improve his behavior,
and he returned to Richmond with Virginia and her mother. He remained
at the 'Messenger' until January 1837. During this period, Poe claimed
that its circulation increased from 700 to 3,500. He published several
poems, and many book reviews, critiques, essays, and articles, as well
as a few stories in the paper. On May 16, 1836, he and Virginia were
officially married at a Presbyterian wedding ceremony performed by
Amasa Converse at their Richmond boarding house, with a witness
falsely attesting Clemm's age as 21.


Philadelphia
==============
In 1838, Poe relocated to Philadelphia, where he lived at four
different residences between 1838 and 1844, one of which at 532 N. 7th
Street has been preserved as a National Historic Landmark.

That same year, Poe's only novel, 'The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym
of Nantucket' was published and widely reviewed. In the summer of
1839, he became assistant editor of 'Burton's Gentleman's Magazine'.
He published numerous articles, stories, and reviews, enhancing the
reputation he had established at the 'Messenger' as one of America's
foremost literary critics. Also in 1839, the collection 'Tales of the
Grotesque and Arabesque' was published in two volumes, though Poe
received little remuneration from it and the volumes received
generally mixed reviews.

In June 1840, Poe published a prospectus announcing his intentions to
start his own journal called 'The Stylus', although he originally
intended to call it 'The Penn', since it would have been based in
Philadelphia. He bought advertising space for the prospectus in the
June 6, 1840, issue of Philadelphia's 'Saturday Evening Post':
'"Prospectus of the Penn Magazine, a Monthly Literary journal to be
edited and published in the city of Philadelphia by Edgar A. Poe."'
However, Poe died before the journal could be produced.

Poe left 'Burton's' after a year and found a position as writer and
co-editor at 'Graham's Magazine', which was a successful monthly
publication. In the last number of 'Graham's' for 1841, Poe was among
the co-signatories to an editorial note of celebration concerning the
tremendous success the magazine had achieved in the past year:
"Perhaps the editors of no magazine, either in America or in Europe,
ever sat down, at the close of a year, to contemplate the progress of
their work with more satisfaction than we do now. Our success has been
unexampled, almost incredible. We may assert without fear of
contradiction that no periodical ever witnessed the same increase
during so short a period."

Around this time, Poe attempted to secure a position in the
administration of John Tyler, claiming that he was a member of the
Whig Party. He hoped to be appointed to the United States Custom House
in Philadelphia with help from President Tyler's son Robert, an
acquaintance of Poe's friend Frederick Thomas. However, Poe failed to
appear for a meeting with Thomas to discuss the appointment in
mid-September 1842, claiming to have been sick, though Thomas believed
that he had been drunk. Poe was promised an appointment, but all
positions were eventually filled by others.

One evening in January 1842, Virginia showed the first signs of
consumption, or tuberculosis, while singing and playing the piano,
which Poe described as the breaking of a blood vessel in her throat.
She only partially recovered, and Poe is alleged to have begun to
drink heavily due to the stress he suffered as a result of her
illness. He then left 'Graham's' and attempted to find a new position,
for a time again angling for a government post. He finally decided to
return to New York where he worked briefly at the 'Evening Mirror'
before becoming editor of the 'Broadway Journal', and later its owner.
There Poe alienated himself from other writers by, among other things,
publicly accusing Henry Wadsworth Longfellow of plagiarism, though
Longfellow never responded. On January 29, 1845, Poe's poem, "The
Raven", appeared in the 'Evening Mirror' and quickly became a popular
sensation. It made Poe a household name almost instantly, though at
the time, he was paid only $9 () for its publication. It was
concurrently published in 'The American Review: A Whig Journal' under
the pseudonym "Quarles".


The Bronx
===========
The 'Broadway Journal' failed in 1846, and Poe then moved to a cottage
in Fordham, New York, in the Bronx. That home, now known as the Edgar
Allan Poe Cottage, was relocated in later years to a park near the
southeast corner of the Grand Concourse and Kingsbridge Road. Nearby,
Poe befriended the Jesuits at St. John's College, now Fordham
University. Virginia died at the cottage on January 30, 1847.
Biographers and critics often suggest that Poe's frequent theme of the
"death of a beautiful woman" stems from the repeated loss of women
throughout his life, including his wife.

Poe was increasingly unstable after his wife's death. He attempted to
court the poet Sarah Helen Whitman, who lived in Providence, Rhode
Island. Their engagement failed, purportedly because of Poe's drinking
and erratic behavior. There is also strong evidence that Whitman's
mother intervened and did much to derail the relationship. Poe then
returned to Richmond and resumed a relationship with his childhood
sweetheart Sarah Elmira Royster.


                               Death
======================================================================
On October 3, 1849, Poe was found semiconscious in Baltimore, "in
great distress, and... in need of immediate assistance", according to
Joseph W. Walker, who found him. He was taken to Washington Medical
College, where he died on Sunday, October 7, 1849, at 5:00 in the
morning.

Poe was not coherent long enough to explain how he came to be in his
dire condition and why he was wearing clothes that were not his own.
He is said to have repeatedly called out the name "Reynolds" on the
night before his death, though it is unclear to whom he was referring.
His attending physician said that Poe's final words were, "Lord help
my poor soul". All of the relevant medical records have been lost,
including Poe's death certificate.

Newspapers at the time reported Poe's death as "congestion of the
brain" or "cerebral inflammation", common euphemisms for death from
disreputable causes such as alcoholism. The actual cause of death
remains a mystery. Speculation has included 'delirium tremens', heart
disease, epilepsy, syphilis, meningeal inflammation, carbon monoxide
poisoning, and rabies. One theory dating from 1872 suggests that Poe's
death resulted from cooping, a form of electoral fraud in which
citizens were forced to vote for a particular candidate, sometimes
leading to violence and even murder.


Griswold's memoir
===================
Immediately after Poe's death, his literary rival Rufus Wilmot
Griswold, wrote a slanted, high-profile obituary under a pseudonym,
filled with falsehoods that cast Poe as a lunatic, and which described
him as a person who "walked the streets, in madness or melancholy,
with lips moving in indistinct curses, or with eyes upturned in
passionate prayers, (never for himself, for he felt, or professed to
feel, that he was already damned)".

The long obituary appeared in the 'New York Tribune', signed, "Ludwig"
on the day Poe was buried in Baltimore. It was further published
throughout the country. The obituary began, "Edgar Allan Poe is dead.
He died in Baltimore the day before yesterday. This announcement will
startle many, but few will be grieved by it." "Ludwig" was soon
identified as Griswold, an editor, critic, and anthologist who had
borne a grudge against Poe since 1842. Griswold somehow became Poe's
literary executor and attempted to destroy his enemy's reputation
after his death.

Griswold wrote a biographical article of Poe called "Memoir of the
Author", which he included in an 1850 volume of the collected works.
There he depicted Poe as a depraved, drunken, drug-addled madman,
including some of Poe's "letters" as evidence. Many of his claims were
either outright lies or obvious distortions; for example, there is
little to no evidence that Edgar Allan Poe was a drug addict.
Griswold's book was denounced by those who knew Poe well, including
John Neal, who published an article defending Poe and attacking
Griswold as a "Rhadamanthus, who is not to be bilked of his fee, a
thimble-full of newspaper notoriety". Griswold's book nevertheless
became a popularly accepted biographical source. This was in part
because it was the only full biography available and was widely
reprinted, and in part because readers thrilled at the thought of
reading works by an "evil" man. Letters that Griswold presented as
proof were later revealed as forgeries.


Genres
========
Poe's best-known fiction works have been labeled as Gothic horror, and
adhere to that genre's general propensity to appeal to the public's
taste for the terrifying or psychologically intimidating. His most
recurrent themes seem to deal with death. The physical signs
indicating death, the nature of decomposition, the popular concerns of
Poe's day about premature burial, the reanimation of the dead, are all
at length explored in his more notable works. Many of his writings are
generally considered to be part of the dark romanticism genre, which
is said to be a literary reaction to transcendentalism, which Poe
strongly criticized. He referred to followers of the transcendental
movement, including Emerson, as "Frog-Pondians", after the pond on
Boston Common, and ridiculed their writings as "metaphor--run mad,"
lapsing into "obscurity for obscurity's sake" or "mysticism for
mysticism's sake". However, Poe once wrote in a letter to Thomas
Holley Chivers that he did not dislike transcendentalists, "only the
pretenders and sophists among them".

Beyond the horror stories he is most famous for, Poe also wrote a
number of satires, humor tales, and hoaxes. He was a master of
sarcasm. For comic effect, he often used irony and ludicrous
extravagance in a deliberate attempt to liberate the reader from
cultural and literary conformity. "Metzengerstein" is the first story
that Poe is known to have published, and his first foray into horror,
but it was originally intended as a burlesque satirizing the popular
genres of Poe's time. Poe was also one of the forerunners of American
science fiction, responding in his voluminous writing to such emerging
literary trends as the explorations into the possibilities of hot air
balloons as featured in such works as, "The Balloon-Hoax".

Much of Poe's work coincided with themes that readers of his day found
appealing, though he often professed to abhor the tastes of the
majority of the people who read for pleasure in his time. In his
critical works, Poe investigated and wrote about many of the
pseudosciences that were then popular with the majority of his fellow
Americans. They included, but were not limited to, the fields of
astrology, cosmology, phrenology, and physiognomy.


Literary theory
=================
Poe's writings often reflect the literary theories he introduced in
his prolific critical works and expounded on in such essays as, "The
Poetic Principle". He disliked didacticism and imitation masquerading
as influence, believing originality to be the highest mark of genius.
In Poe's conception of the artist's life, the attainment of the
concretization of beauty should be the ultimate goal. That which is
unique is alone of value. Works with obvious meanings, he wrote, cease
to be art. He believed that any work worthy of being praised should
have as its focus a single specific effect. That which does not tend
towards the effect is extraneous. In his view, every serious writer
must carefully calculate each sentiment and idea in his or her work to
ensure that it strengthens the theme of the piece.

Poe describes the method he employed while composing his most famous
poem, "The Raven", in an essay entitled "The Philosophy of
Composition". However, many of Poe's critics have questioned whether
the method enunciated in the essay was formulated before the poem was
written, or afterward, or, as T. S. Eliot is quoted as saying, "It is
difficult for us to read that essay without reflecting that if Poe
plotted out his poem with such calculation, he might have taken a
little more pains over it: the result hardly does credit to the
method." Biographer Joseph Wood Krutch described the essay as "a
rather highly ingenious exercise in the art of rationalization".


Influence
===========
During his lifetime, Poe was mostly recognized as a literary critic.
The vast majority of Edgar Allan Poe's writings are nonfictional.
Contemporary critic James Russell Lowell called him, "the most
discriminating, philosophical, and fearless critic upon imaginative
works who has written in America," suggesting--rhetorically--that he
occasionally used prussic acid instead of ink. Poe's often caustic
reviews earned him the reputation of being a "tomahawk man". One
target of Poe's criticism was Boston's acclaimed poet Henry Wadsworth
Longfellow, who was defended by his friends, literary and otherwise,
in what was later called, "The Longfellow War". Poe accused Longfellow
of "the heresy of the didactic", writing poetry that was preachy,
derivative, and thematically plagiarized. Poe correctly predicted that
Longfellow's reputation and style of poetry would decline, concluding,
"We grant him high qualities, but deny him the Future".

Poe became known as the creator of a type of fiction that was
difficult to categorize and nearly impossible to imitate. He was one
of the first American authors of the 19th century to become more
popular in Europe than in the United States. Poe was particularly
esteemed in France, in part due to early translations of his work by
Charles Baudelaire. Baudelaire's translations became definitive
renditions of Poe's work in Continental Europe.

Poe's early mystery tales featuring the detective, C. Auguste Dupin,
though not numerous, laid the groundwork for similar characters that
would eventually become famous throughout the world. Sir Arthur Conan
Doyle said, "Each [of Poe's detective stories] is a root from which a
whole literature has developed.... Where was the detective story until
Poe breathed the breath of life into it?" The Mystery Writers of
America have named their awards for excellence in the mystery genre
"The Edgars". Poe's work also influenced writings that would
eventually come to be called "science fiction", notably the works of
Jules Verne, who wrote a sequel to Poe's novel 'The Narrative of
Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket' called 'An Antarctic Mystery', also
known as 'The Sphinx of the Ice Fields'. And as the author H. G. Wells
noted, "'Pym' tells what a very intelligent mind could imagine about
the south polar region a century ago". In 2013, 'The Guardian' cited
'Pym' as one of the greatest novels ever written in the English
language, and noted its influence on later authors such as Doyle,
Henry James, B. Traven, and David Morrell.

Horror author and historian H. P. Lovecraft was heavily influenced by
Poe's horror tales, dedicating an entire section of his long essay,
"Supernatural Horror in Literature", to his influence on the genre. In
his letters, Lovecraft described Poe as his "God of Fiction".
Lovecraft's earliest stories are clearly influenced by Poe. 'At the
Mountains of Madness' directly quotes him. Lovecraft made extensive
use of Poe's concept of the "unity of effect" in his fiction. Alfred
Hitchcock once said, "It's because I liked Edgar Allan Poe's stories
so much that I began to make suspense films". Many references to Poe's
works are present in Vladimir Nabokov's novels. The Japanese author
Tarō Hirai derived his pen name, Edogawa Ranpo, from an altered
phonetic rendering of Poe's name.

Poe's works have spawned many imitators. In 1863, a medium named
Lizzie Doten published 'Poems of the Inner Life', which compiled
several poems she claimed were written by the channeled spirits of
dead authors. She claimed six were by Poe, though Poe scholar
Christopher P. Semtner dismisses them as "merely pastiches".

Poe has also received criticism. This is partly because of the
negative perception of his personal character and its influence upon
his reputation. William Butler Yeats was occasionally critical of Poe
and once called him "vulgar". Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson
reacted to "The Raven" by saying, "I see nothing in it", and
derisively referred to Poe as "the jingle man". Aldous Huxley wrote
that Poe's writing "falls into vulgarity" by being "too poetical"--the
equivalent of wearing a diamond ring on every finger.

It is believed that only twelve copies have survived of Poe's first
book 'Tamerlane and Other Poems'. In December 2009, one copy sold at
Christie's auctioneers in New York City for $662,500, a record price
paid for a work of American literature.


Physics and cosmology
=======================
'Eureka: A Prose Poem', an essay written in 1848, included a
cosmological theory that presaged the Big Bang theory by 80 years, as
well as the first plausible solution to Olbers' paradox.
Poe eschewed the scientific method in 'Eureka' and instead wrote from
pure intuition. For this reason, he considered it a work of art, not
science, but insisted that it was still true and considered it to be
his career masterpiece. Even so, 'Eureka' is full of scientific
errors. In particular, Poe's suggestions ignored Newtonian principles
regarding the density and rotation of planets.


Cryptography
==============
Poe had a keen interest in cryptography. He had placed a notice of his
abilities in the Philadelphia paper 'Alexander's Weekly (Express)
Messenger', inviting submissions of ciphers which he proceeded to
solve. In July 1841, Poe had published an essay called "A Few Words on
Secret Writing" in 'Graham's Magazine'. Capitalizing on public
interest in the topic, he wrote "The Gold-Bug" incorporating ciphers
as an essential part of the story. Poe's success with cryptography
relied not so much on his deep knowledge of that field (his method was
limited to the simple substitution cryptogram) as on his knowledge of
the magazine and newspaper culture. His keen analytical abilities,
which were so evident in his detective stories, allowed him to see
that the general public was largely ignorant of the methods by which a
simple substitution cryptogram can be solved, and he used this to his
advantage. The sensation that Poe created with his cryptography stunts
played a major role in popularizing cryptograms in newspapers and
magazines.

Two ciphers he published in 1841 under the name "W. B. Tyler" were not
solved until 1992 and 2000 respectively. One was a quote from Joseph
Addison's play 'Cato'; the other is probably based on a poem by Hester
Thrale.

Poe had an influence on cryptography beyond increasing public interest
during his lifetime. William Friedman, America's foremost
cryptologist, was heavily influenced by Poe. Friedman's initial
interest in cryptography came from reading "The Gold-Bug" as a child,
an interest that he later put to use in deciphering Japan's PURPLE
code during World War II.


Character
===========
The historical Edgar Allan Poe has appeared as a fictionalized
character, often in order to represent the "mad genius" or "tormented
artist" and in order to exploit his personal struggles. Many such
depictions also blend in with characters from his stories, suggesting
that Poe and his characters share identities. Often, fictional
depictions of Poe use his mystery-solving skills in such novels as
'The Poe Shadow' by Matthew Pearl.


Preserved homes, landmarks, and museums
=========================================
No childhood home of Poe is still standing, including the Allan
family's Moldavia estate. The oldest standing home in Richmond, the
Old Stone House, is in use as the Edgar Allan Poe Museum, though Poe
never lived there. The collection includes many items that Poe used
during his time with the Allan family, and also features several rare
first printings of Poe works. 13 West Range is the dorm room that Poe
is believed to have used while studying at the University of Virginia
in 1826; it is preserved and available for visits. Its upkeep is
overseen by a group of students and staff known as the Raven Society.

The earliest surviving home in which Poe lived is at 203 North Amity
St. in Baltimore, which is preserved as the Edgar Allan Poe House and
Museum. Poe is believed to have lived in the home at the age of 23
when he first lived with Maria Clemm and Virginia and possibly his
grandmother and possibly his brother William Henry Leonard Poe.

Between 1834 and 1844, Poe lived in at least four different
Philadelphia residences, including the Indian Queen Hotel at 15 S. 4th
Street, at a residence at 16th and Locust Streets, at 2502 Fairmount
Street, and then in the Spring Garden section of the city at 532 N.
7th Street, a residence that has been preserved by the National Park
Service as the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site. Poe's final
home in Bronx, New York City, is preserved as the Edgar Allan Poe
Cottage.

In Boston, a commemorative plaque on Boylston Street is several blocks
away from the actual location of Poe's birth. The house which was his
birthplace at 62 Carver Street no longer exists; also, the street has
since been renamed "Charles Street South". A "square" at the
intersection of Broadway, Fayette, and Carver Streets had once been
named in his honor, but it disappeared when the streets were
rearranged. In 2009, the intersection of Charles and Boylston streets
(two blocks north of his birthplace) was designated "Edgar Allan Poe
Square".

In March 2014, fundraising was completed for construction of a
permanent memorial sculpture, known as 'Poe Returning to Boston', at
this location. The winning design by Stefanie Rocknak depicts a
life-sized Poe striding against the wind, accompanied by a flying
raven; his suitcase lid has fallen open, leaving a "paper trail" of
literary works embedded in the sidewalk behind him. The public
unveiling on October 5, 2014, was attended by former U.S. poet
laureate Robert Pinsky.

Other Poe landmarks include a building on the Upper West Side, where
Poe temporarily lived when he first moved to New York City. A plaque
suggests that Poe wrote "The Raven" here. On Sullivan's Island in
Charleston County, South Carolina, the setting of Poe's tale "The
Gold-Bug" and where Poe served in the Army in 1827 at Fort Moultrie,
there is a restaurant called Poe's Tavern. In the Fell's Point section
of Baltimore, a bar still stands where legend says that Poe was last
seen drinking before his death. Known as "The Horse You Came in On",
local lore insists that a ghost whom they call "Edgar" haunts the
rooms above.


Poe Toaster
=============
Between 1949 and 2009, a bottle of cognac and three roses were left at
Poe's original grave marker every January 19 by an unknown visitor
affectionately referred to as the "Poe Toaster". Sam Porpora was a
historian at the Westminster Church in Baltimore, where Poe is buried;
he claimed on August 15, 2007, that he had started the tradition in
1949. Porpora said that the tradition began in order to raise money
and enhance the profile of the church. His story has not been
confirmed, and some details which he gave to the press are factually
inaccurate. The Poe Toaster's last appearance was on January 19, 2009,
the day of Poe's bicentennial.


                       List of selected works
======================================================================
Short stories

* "Berenice"
* "The Black Cat"
* "The Cask of Amontillado"
* "A Descent into the Maelström"
* "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar"
* "The Fall of the House of Usher"
* "The Gold-Bug"
* "Hop-Frog"
* "The Imp of the Perverse"
* "Ligeia"
* "The Masque of the Red Death"
* "Morella"
* "The Murders in the Rue Morgue"
* "Never Bet the Devil Your Head"
* "The Oval Portrait"
* "The Pit and the Pendulum"
* "The Premature Burial"
* "The Purloined Letter"
* "The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether"
* "The Tell-Tale Heart"
* "Loss of Breath"
* "William Wilson"

Poetry

* "Al Aaraaf"
* "Annabel Lee"
* "The Bells"
* "The City in the Sea"
* "The Conqueror Worm"
* "A Dream Within a Dream"
* "Eldorado"
* "Eulalie"
* "The Haunted Palace"
* "To Helen"
* "Lenore"
* "Tamerlane"
* "The Raven"
* "Ulalume"


Other works
* 'Politian' (1835) - Poe's only play
* 'The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket' (1838) - Poe's
only complete novel
* 'The Journal of Julius Rodman' (1840) - Poe's second, unfinished
novel
* "The Balloon-Hoax" (1844) - A journalistic hoax printed as a true
story
* "The Philosophy of Composition" (1846) - Essay
* 'Eureka: A Prose Poem' (1848) - Essay
* "The Poetic Principle" (1848) - Essay
* "The Light-House" (1849) - Poe's last, incomplete work


                              See also
======================================================================
* Edgar Allan Poe and music
* Poe, a crater on Mercury
*


Sources
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*
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*  Based on
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* . Harrowitz discusses Poe's "tales of ratiocination" in the light of
Charles Sanders Peirce's logic of making good guesses or abductive
reasoning.
*
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*
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*
*
*
*
*
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*
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*  (1992 reprint: )
*
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* *
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*  (Originally published in 1941 by New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts,
Inc.)
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*  (1968 edition printed by Rutgers University Press)
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                          Further reading
======================================================================
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Robinson, Marilynne, "On Edgar Allan Poe", 'The New York Review of
Books', vol. LXII, no. 2 (February 5, 2015), pp. 4, 6.
*


                           External links
======================================================================
*
*
*
*
*
* [https://www.nps.gov/edal/index.htm Edgar Allan Poe National
Historic Site]
* [http://www.eapoe.org/ Edgar Allan Poe Society in Baltimore]
* [http://www.poemuseum.org/ Poe Museum in Richmond, Virginia]
* [http://www.shapell.org/manuscript.aspx?169898 Edgar Allan Poe's
Personal Correspondence]  Shapell Manuscript Foundation
*
[http://research.hrc.utexas.edu:8080/hrcxtf/view?docId=ead/00109.xml&query=edgar%20allen%20poe&query-join=and
Edgar Allan Poe's Collection]  at the Harry Ransom Center at The
University of Texas at Austin
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8301128.stm 'Funeral' honours
Edgar Allan Poe] BBC News (with video) 2009-10-11
* [http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/POE/contents.html Selected
Stories]  from American Studies at the University of Virginia
*
*
* [https://findingaids.library.columbia.edu/ead/nnc-rb/ldpd_4079225
Finding aid to Edgar Allan Poe papers at Columbia University. Rare
Book & Manuscript Library.]


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