Lecture IV Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

E.A. Poe, the son of travelling actors, happened to be born in Boston on January 19, 1809. His life of misery started with the disappearance of his alcoholic father shortly after his birth, and the death of his mother in 1811. He was brought up by a childless couple, Mr. John Allan, a wealthy Richmond tobacco merchant, and his wife, Mrs. John Allan. The foster-mother treated Edgar so kindly that it led to jealousy on the part of her husband: as a result the boy was never formally adopted. The boy was raised and educated as the son of aristocrats, but he had no legal rights as Allan’s heir.

The family went to England in 1815, where Poe had five years of excellent schooling. Back in the USA, he was sent to the University of Virginia, where he showed a remarkable gift for maths, chemistry and medicine. There he began to write poetry and all the while he read, and read, and read. Yet Poe was unhappy at the University. Mr. Allan allowed him hardly any money, and his pride was wounded by the social barrier between him and the rich southern boys. Edgar took to gambling and drinking, and fell in debt. Mr. Allan refused to honour his debts and removed him from the University. In 1827, after a violent quarrel with his foster-father, Poe ran away from home.

Then a period of service in the army (1827-1829) and a brief career at West Point (1830-1831) followed. In 1834 Mr. Allan died, though a millionaire, he didn’t mention Poe in his will, and Edgar was left penniless. He fled to his illiterate, but adoring aunt, Mrs. Maria Clemm, in Baltimore. He was obliged to make a living as a journalist. He wrote tales, poems, reviews, anything that would bring in money, and he even became editor of the magazine “The Messenger”.

Under his guidance its circulation quadrupled; and his own essays established his reputation as a leading literary critic. Unfortunately, he was developing another reputation as well, for emotional instability and bouts of drunkenness. His drinking was, however, exaggerated: his constitution

could not tolerate alcohol and even a slight amount made him senseless.

In 1836 he married Mrs. Clemm’s daughter, Virginia, then 13 years old. Their home life was very happy, but their poverty was extreme. Soon, in 1842, his young wife became very ill with tuberculosis. Poe was in despair, because he had no money to cure her. In 1847 Virginia died, she was only 24. Her death plunged him into a confused search for emotional security with several women. In the last year of his life he was twice engaged to be married.

His life ended under very strange and macabre circumstances. He was in Richmond giving lectures with brilliant success and even earned a large sum of money. Six days later he was found in torn clothing, lying unconscious on a sidewalk in the rain. It was suspected that he had been given opium and robbed of the money he had earned. He died four days later on October 7, 1849 without fully regaining consciousness.