| Edgar
Allan Poe was born on January 19, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts,
to parents who were itinerant actors. His father David
Poe Jr. died probably in 1810 and his mother Elizabeth
Hopkins Poe in 1811. Edgar was taken into the home of
a Richmond merchant John Allan and brought up partly
in England (1815-20), where he attended Manor School
at Stoke Newington. Never legally adopted, Poe took
Allan's name for his middle name.
Poe attended the University of Virginia
(1826), but was expelled for not paying his gambling
debts. This led to a quarrel with Allan, who later disowned
him. In 1827 Poe joined the U.S. Army as a common soldier
under assumed name and age. In 1830 Poe entered West
Point and was dishonorably discharged next year, for
intentional neglect of his duties.
Little is known about his life in
this time, but in 1833 he lived in Baltimore with his
father's sister. After winning a prize of $50 for the
short story "MS Found in a Bottle," he started a career
as a staff member of various magazines, among others
the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond (1835-37),
Burton's Gentleman's Magazine in Philadelphia (1839-40),
and Graham's Magazine (1842-43). During these years
he wrote some of his best-known stories.
In 1836 Poe married his 13-year-old
cousin Virginia Clemm. She burst a blood vessel in 1842,
and remained a virtual invalid until her death from
tuberculosis five years later. After the death of his
wife, Poe began to lose his struggle with drinking and
drugs. He addressed the famous poem "Annabel Lee" (1849)
to her.
Poe's first collection, Tales of the
Grotesque and Arabesque, appeared in 1840. It contained
one of his most famous works, "The Fall of the House
of Usher." During the early 1840s Poe's best-selling
work was The Conchologist's First Book (1839). The dark
poem of lost love, "The Raven," brought Poe national
fame, when it appeared in 1845. The Murders in the Rue
Morgue(1841) and The Purloined Letter are among Poe's
most famous detective stories. Poe was also one of the
most prolific literary journalists in American history.
Poe suffered from bouts of depression
and madness, and he attempted suicide in 1848. In September
the following year he disappeared for three days after
a drink at a birthday party and on his way to visit
his new fiancée in Richmond. He turned up in a delirious
condition in Baltimore gutter and died on October 7,
1849. |
