Edgar Allan Poe is considered to be America’s first significant literary critic or, at least, the first major writer in America to write seriously about criticism, about the theory of composition, and about the principles of creative art. He was also the first to set down a consistent set of […]
Read more Critical Essays Poe’s Critical TheoriesCritical Essays Edgar Allan Poe and Romanticism
Introduction Few writers exist outside of the currents of the times in which they live, and Poe is no exception. He is clearly a product of his time, which in terms of literature, is called the Romantic era. The Romantic movement was one which began in Germany, moved through all […]
Read more Critical Essays Edgar Allan Poe and RomanticismSummary and Analysis “The Masque of the Red Death”
Summary In “The Masque of the Red Death,” Poe presents an age-old theme, a theme as old as the medieval morality play Everyman. In this ancient play, the main character is named Everyman and early in the play while walking down the road, he meets another character called Death. Everyman […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Masque of the Red Death”Summary and Analysis “The Pit and the Pendulum”
Summary As Poe repeatedly maintained in his critical views, the most successful story occurs when the author decides what effect or effects he wants to achieve and then decides what techniques to use to achieve that effect. In “The Pit and the Pendulum,” Poe apparently had in mind the effects […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Pit and the Pendulum”Summary and Analysis “William Wilson”
Summary The narrator of this short story prefers that his real name remain a secret. For the present, he says, we should call him “William Wilson.” The reason for this secrecy, he says, is that his real name would stain the purity of the white paper he writes upon; in […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “William Wilson”Summary and Analysis “The Cask of Amontillado”
Summary “The Cask of Amontillado” has been almost universally referred to as Poe’s most perfect short story; in fact, it has often been considered to be one of the world’s most perfect short stories. Furthermore, it conforms to and illustrates perfectly many of Poe’s literary theories about the nature of […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Cask of Amontillado”Summary and Analysis “The Black Cat”
Summary More than any of Poe’s stories, “The Black Cat” illustrates best the capacity of the human mind to observe its own deterioration and the ability of the mind to comment upon its own destruction without being able to objectively halt that deterioration. The narrator of “The Black Cat” is […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Black Cat”Summary and Analysis “The Tell-Tale Heart”
Summary Even though this is one of Poe’s shortest stories, it is nevertheless a profound and, at times, ambiguous investigation of a man’s paranoia. The story gains its intensity by the manner in which it portrays how the narrator stalks his victim — as though he were a beast of […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Tell-Tale Heart”Summary and Analysis “The Purloined Letter”
Summary Of all of Poe’s stories of ratiocination (or detective stories), “The Purloined Letter” is considered his finest. This is partially due to the fact that there are no gothic elements, such as the gruesome descriptions of dead bodies, as there was in “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” But […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Purloined Letter”Summary and Analysis “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”
Summary Because it was Poe’s first tale of ratiocination, “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” introduces more basic features of detective fiction than any of Poe’s other short stories. Among these basic features are three central ideas: (1) the murder occurs in a locked room from which there is no […]
Read more Summary and Analysis “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”