Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe - Essay Example

of Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe was a famous in the nineteenth century and has a wide readership even today. His work has been praised and criticized by millions around the world, mostly for his poem The Raven. Poe’s mysterious style of writing received a lot of criticism over the years and Harold Bloom compared his poetry with Wordsworth in the following manner. Wordsworth and Poe are thus telling symmetrically inverse stories about the nature of poetic language. Wordsworth attempts to prevent the poetic figure from losing its natural passion, from repeating itself as an empty, mechanical device of style... Poe writes a poem packed with clichés in order to show that those clichés cannot succeed in remaining empty, that there is also a natural passion involved in repetition, that the mechanical is of a piece with the profoundest pain. (Bloom, 24) Poe was born on the 19th of January 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts, to David Poe Jr. and Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe- both established actors. He had an older brother named William Henry Leonard Poe and a younger sister, Rosalie Poe. In 1810, Poe’s father abandoned them, and within a year, their mother died of consumption also known as tuberculosis, a highly contagious bacterial infection. Poe was too young to be influenced by the death of his mother at the time it occurred, but later reflections in adulthood led him to grieve for how much better his home life would have been, if he never had to live with a foster family. His mother’s death by the dreaded disease of the time, tuberculosis, would be a common source of death in others who would matter much later in his life. Edgar and his brother and sister were split up and sent to live with different families; Edgar went to live with a man by the name of John Allan who was a Scottish tobacco merchant living in Richmond, Virginia; who was always abusive toward him. . “Although Poe seemed happy, deep inside he was confused. Because he was never formally adopted, he felt uncertain about his position in the Allan family and his doubt often made him cross and dejected.” (Poe & Bagert, 5)They fought constantly, and Edgar finally enlisted in the Army just to get away from him. John Allan was often under the influence of alcohol during the fights but out of respect for the Allan Family, Edgar took the middle name of Allan. Edgar began to write poetry regularly when he was in his early teens. He fell in love with a girl named Elmira, and they eventually pledged themselves to each other. In 1826, he was sent to the University of Virginia to study law. His rich foster Father John Allan with whom Edgar always had a chaotic relationship gave him a mere $100 to cover his yearly expenses that totaled to an estimated $450. Under such circumstances, the young man got highly indebted and began gambling in an attempt to make up for his losses. On top of this, Elmira’s letters to him had been intercepted by their parents and having received no encouraging replies from Edgar; she was persuaded to get engaged to another man. After this tragic event, Edgar began drinking seriously. He had little resistance to alcohol and easily became violent and irrational whenever he drank too much. By the end of the year, Mr. Allan pulled Edgar from the University and after loud and spiteful fights with his foster father; Edgar left home and made his way to Boston. In 1827, he published his first pamphlet of Tamerlane and Other Poems, which is so rare nowadays that a single copy was sold in 2009 for $660,000. “This is known as the Black tulip of U.S. Literature…” (Wahlgren). However, at that time Poe enlisted in the army as Edgar A. Perry at the age of eighteen, stating on the application that he was twenty-two in order to earn a living. In 1829, after his beloved foster mother died, he applied to West Point military academy with the support of his commanding officer and foster father. By 1832, Edgar began to write fiction with the idea of entering story contests. He also discovered opium during this period. It was a commonly used medicine at that time and was used as a stimulant that masked hunger and cold and extended sense of time. During the summer, he had an affair with a girl named Mary Deveraux, which eventually ended, largely because of his frightening behavior when he was under the influence of alcohol or drugs. In 1833, he won a $50 literary prize from a Baltimore newspaper for his story, Ms. Found in a Bottle. This brought him his first major recognition and fame in local literary circles. John Allan died in March of 1834, leaving nothing of value for his adopted son. Poe soon started taking laudanum along with opium and alcohol. In 1835, he returned to Richmond to work as an editor on the Southern Literary Messenger. “Poe soon developed a reputation as a fearless critic who not only attacked an author’s work but also insulted the author and the northern literary establishment.” (Poe Museum) During that time, he also married his thirteen-year old cousin Virginia, first in a secret ceremony, and eventually in a more public one, where it was claimed on the certificate that Virginia was twenty-one years old. After moving to several places and switching a number of jobs, his small family consisting of Edgar, Virginia and Muddy, Virginia’s mother ended up in Philadelphia, where Poe worked for Burtons Gentlemans Magazine. It was during that time that Poe wrote some of his best-known stories of horror and the supernatural. He also hatched a dream to start his own magazine: The Penn Magazine later renamed as The Stylus. A plan was soon drawn up to support Poes magazine project through political contacts. His attempt to gain an appointment at the Philadelphia Custom House didnt succeed, but in 1843 he was invited to give a lecture in Washington D. C. and to be received by the president at the White House. This was perhaps the greatest opportunity of Poes life to make a good impression and helpful allies. But within a few nights of his arrival in D. C., Poe had been persuaded to have drinks at a dinner party. This led to heavier drinking. His lecture was eventually cancelled, and when he did appear at the White House, he was drunk and made a fool of himself. With his chances for support of his magazine ruined, he returned to Philadelphia. Although Poe wrote many famous poems but nothing brought him as much fame as the publication of his poem The Raven in 1845. The poem became a national sensation within a few weeks, and was reprinted in newspapers and periodicals across the country. As there were no copyright laws at that time, therefore the reprints brought Poe not a single cent and he continued to live in poverty. As he watched his wife Virginia dying slowly, it certainly stimulated his self-destructiveness. His poem The Conqueror Worm, written during that dark period of his life, projects the image of a destructive worm or maggot, and the decay of humankind: “But see, amid the mimic rout /A crawling shape intrude! /A blood-red thing that writhes from out / The scenic solitude! /.../ In human gore imbued.” (25-32) Virginia’s health continued to decline, and in January 1847 at the age of twenty-five she succumbed to her long-suffered disease, tuberculosis. Poe was devastated and wrote these words in her memory: “Deep in earth my love is lying and I must weep alone.” (MysteryNet.com). Edgar got engaged to Sarah Helen Whitman in 1848. “But Poe’s wild ways eventually became too much for even the loving Whitman. He did not quit drinking, so she decided to break off the engagement. Another reason was that Whitman’s mother believed Poe only wanted to get married was because he was poor and her family was rich. The broken engagement was another horrible blow to Poe. Again, depression followed.” (Burlingame, 81) He eventually worked his way back to Richmond where he wooed Mrs. Shelton, the now-widowed Elmira of his youth, who had promised to marry him some twenty-four years earlier. They were soon engaged and the wedding date was set for October 17, 1849. In September, Poe left to visit friends and relatives and to look after some business, travelling toward New York City via Baltimore and Philadelphia. He never made it past Baltimore. He arrived there drunk and disappeared for a mysterious five days. He was eventually found in a delirium and taken to the hospital where he clung to life for a few more days. Edgar Allan Poe died on Sunday October 7, 1849 at the age of forty. His last words were: "Lord help my poor soul."(Bagert, 7) An anonymous visitor has been bringing three red roses and a bottle of cognac to Poes grave at Westminster Church in Baltimore on the anniversary of the writers birthday every year, since 1949. Even today, Poe is misunderstood by his readers and critics. He believed: It is more than probable that I am not understood; but I fear, indeed, that it is in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general reader, an adequate idea of that nervous intensity of interest with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak technically) busied and buried themselves, in the contemplation of even the most ordinary objects of the universe. (Poe, 52) Work Cited Ed. Brod Bagert. “Edgar Allan Poe”. New York: Sterling Publishin Company, 1995. Print. Burlingame, Jeff. “Edgar Allan Poe: Deep Into That Darkness Peering”. USA: Enslow Publishers, 2008. Print. Bloom, H. “Edgar Allan Poe”. New York: InfoBase Publishing, 2006. Print. Mystery Net. The Place for Mystery since 1995. Web. 10 June 2011. Poe, E. “Edgar Allan Poes Annotated Short Stories”. USA: Bottletree Books LLC, 2008. Print. Poe Museum.The Museum of Edgar Allan Poe. 2010. Web. 10th June 2011. Poe Stories. An Exploration of Short Stories by Edgar Allan Poe. 1 July 2005. Web. 10 June 2011. Poem Hunter. Edgar Allan Poe. 10 June 2011. Wahlgren, Francis. “Poes Tamerlane Book Sold for $660K”. December 6, 2009. Web. Read More