(born January 19th 1809 in Boston)
.E. A. Poe turned orphan allready at the age of one (his parents were actors) and grew up in the house of the trader John Allen, who brought him up and provided education for him, but still never adopted him. After visiting schools in England and studying at the University of Virginia he joined the army, surely also because of an disagreement with J. Allen, and first started writing. He published a magazine of literature and was a dreaded critic. The poems and stories he wrote were not apprechiated in his lifetime, so he died the 7.10.1848 in Baltimore as an alcoholic and totally impoverished.
Poe was the 'godfather' of horror literature! His work is of an incredible meaning and message, literary creativity and strenght, that is unequalled until today. Nobody could translate his inner deamons thus into literature as that tiny, frail man from Boston.
Bibliography:
A very good collection of Poe's Stories is:
Stories
of Horror (I-III)
Poe's
House in Richmond
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Poe's
Garden
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Poe's
Working-Room
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