Edgar Allan Poe

Legacy: the Artists Behind the Legends

Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer, literary critic, and editor, who is remembered for his incredibly imaginative and sometimes utterly chilling short stories and poetry. Poe is regarded by many educators and scholars as the architect of the modern short story, as well as the inventor of the detective fiction genre. Certain aspects of Poe’s life were very similar to his work in that they are mysterious and unknown, and since his death, the true facts of Edgar Allan Poe’s days on this earth are pretty hard to make out. He seemed to find himself constantly surrounded by death and despair, and regardless of his literary popularity and renowned, Poe struggled financially through all forty of his years. But there are some pretty crazy instances in Poe’s life that make him an absolutely fascinating character of history: for one, he LOVED cats…to a kind of weird degree; he married his wife he was twenty-six and she was thirteen (I know gross – though there are quite a few historians who firmly believe they had a strictly platonic relationship); he was the first well-known American writer to try and earn a living through writing alone, though like I previously mentioned, poverty was a lifelong curse for him; and of course, there is the giant conspiracy behind his death, which we will discuss in depth at the end of the episode. So let’s get right into this week and examine the life, and death, of the mysterious Edgar Allan Poe.