I finally got around to finishing my Edgar Allan Poe anthology and thought i would swing by the boards to hear your opinions on his work.
My book included the following stories: The Gold-Bug, The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar, MS. Found in a Bottle, A Descent into the Maelström, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Mystery of Marie Rogêt, The Purloined Letter, The Black Cat, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Premature Burial, The Masque of the Red Death, The Cask of Amontillado, The Imp of the Perverse, The Oval Portrait, The Assignation, The Tell-Tale Heart, The System of Dr Tarr and Professor Fether, The Angel of the Odd, The Man of the Crowd, "Thou Art the Man", Hop-Frog, Berenice, Ligeia, Morella, his only novel the Narrative of A. Gordon Pym and his famous poem the Raven.
My definite favourite is the Pit and the Pendulum; a strange story but very well-written and out of the ordinary. His murder mysteries were interesting in that his hero solved them mostly from his living room by way of logic. In Marie Roget they even just insert a parenthesåis saying they caught the killer by way of his final conclusion.
The Premature Burial was interesting and quite good, but also showcases one of his weaknesses as a storyteller; he has a tendency to digress a lot. His novel is also guilty of this, where he spends pages explaining the nesting habits of albatrosses and nautical terms. I forgave the Gold-Bug for doing it since the character was mainly playing around with cryptology which was fun enough really.
Besides the above his novel was actually a positive surprise for me; might actually be my second favourite, or at least in my top 5. By far the best of his maritime stories of which there are a few; the sea is a recurring theme.
Also interesting to read some of his more humourous works; The System of Dr Tarr and Professor Fether and the Angel of the Odd specifically. In the latter the elderly protagonist is haunted by an "angel" made up of wine bottles who controls random circumstances and curse the poor man.
Along with his naval theme, he also explores interesting philosophical and existential questions and questions of madness and sanity throughout his stories; he has more than one story where the villain is driven to confession by way of madness or guilt. I also found the Man of the Crowd philosophically interesting.
Other stories worthy of mention: Hop-Frog,The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar, The Tell-tale Heart, the Fall of the House of Usher, perhaps Ligeia and the Masque of the Red Death.
I think one of his greatest strengths as a writer is his ability to credibly portray states of mind; there was a point in the Pym novel where they were stranded starving on a ship where you could almost feel the desolation and desperation. This skill is also noticable in the Tell-tale Heart and the Premature Burial.
Hope I have inspired you to read Poe yourself or to comment in some way.
(this is the book I read Best of Edgar Allan Poe (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Best-Edgar-Allan-Poe-Unabridged/dp/1853757004/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1258160377&sr=8-1-spell). I really admired the graphic design done on this. It's very nice. Also, it has one of those fancy bookmark cords attached).
Quote from: Cataclysmic CrowI think one of his greatest strengths as a writer is his ability to credibly portray states of mind; there was a point in the Pym novel where they were stranded starving on a ship where you could almost feel the desolation and desperation. This skill is also noticable in the Tell-tale Heart and the Premature Burial.
Fact: the chamber described in The Pit and the Pendulum never actually existed, save for within the imagination of Poe and his readers.
All in all, I agree with your reviews. His Dupin stories (precursor to another detective, by the name of Holmes) are, in my opinion, the best examples of his digressions. It makes some of his stories hard to follow at times, but if you can manage it, it's usually worth it.
I've read some.
It's good to see what the original version of these stories is like. They keep getting adapted to other media or up-dated or referenced.
My feeling is one problem with some of Poe's work is that it looks like it was writen before the paragraph break really took off. Ginormous blocks of text.
I've read Pym for a class before and I hated it. I know it's a satirization of the 'discovery/exploration' books popular in his day but... The book was terrible.
Other than Pym and Raven, I haven't had much exposure to Poe :(
Yeah, would have been somewhat surprised if the Pit/Pendulum room existed ^^ Would have made the inquisition climb the craziness scale a few steps.
Hmm, the Pym story is really split into three parts which are quite different; the introduction where they sail out in a storm, the middle part where they are stranded on a whaling ship, and part three where they explore the Antarctic. Part one is decent, but not terribly exciting and part three is somewhat odd and reminds me sort of Jules Verne (perhaps the Journey to the Center of the Earth) in that Poe explores places known to exist, but the nature of which are unknown so he takes it in some wild directions. The second part is by far the best: [spoiler] with Pym being trapped in the hold of the suffocating whaling ship and with the mutiny and finally the traumatizing part where they are shipwrecked in the middle of the ocean[/spoiler]
Although I can see some similarities in the themes of madness, I was a bit surprised to see that Poe was quite different from Lovecraft even though the latter was thoroughly inspired by the former. Of course there are stories where you can see the similitary (especially in stories like the Masque of the Red Death, the Black Cat, and the Oval Painting i believe), but they really are very different authors.
I always thought that the pit was really just a 1 ft. deep hole, but the character was scared into thinking that it was really a deep pit. But that's what a lot of Poe's stories are, just regular things that appear different based on the character's state of mind.( Though I haven't read a lot of his stuff.)