Tales of Edgar Allan Poe

by Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. This is a collection of those tales.

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Classics, Short Stories

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1980

About the author

The name Poe brings to mind images of murderers and madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return from the dead. His works have been in print since 1827 and include such literary classics as The Tell-Tale Heart, The Raven, and The Fall of the House of Usher. This versatile writer’s oeuvre includes short stories, poetry, a novel, a textbook, a book of scientific theory, and hundreds of essays and book reviews. He is widely acknowledged as the inventor of the modern detective story and an innovator in the science fiction genre, but he made his living as America’s first great literary critic and theoretician. Poe’s reputation today rests primarily on his tales of terror as well as on his haunting lyric poetry.

Just as the bizarre characters in Poe’s stories have captured the public imagination so too has Poe himself. He is seen as a morbid, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows of moonlit cemeteries or crumbling castles. This is the Poe of legend. But much of what we know about Poe is wrong, the product of a biography written by one of his enemies in an attempt to defame the author’s name.

The real Poe was born to traveling actors in Boston on January 19, 1809. Edgar was the second of three children. His other brother William Henry Leonard Poe would also become a poet before his early death, and Poe’s sister Rosalie Poe would grow up to teach penmanship at a Richmond girls’ school. Within three years of Poe’s birth both of his parents had died, and he was taken in by the wealthy tobacco merchant John Allan and his wife Frances Valentine Allan in Richmond, Virginia while Poe’s siblings went to live with other families. Mr. Allan would rear Poe to be a businessman and a Virginia gentleman, but Poe had dreams of being a writer in emulation of his childhood hero the British poet Lord Byron. Early poetic verses found written in a young Poe’s handwriting on the backs of Allan’s ledger sheets reveal how little interest Poe had in the tobacco business.

For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_al...

Reviews

[Stephanie McGuirk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nice little spooky story collection. More psychological horror than gory. More rooted in reality than in the supernatural. My absolute favorites were The Premature Burial, Hop-Frog, and The Pit and the Pendulum. The only ones I didn't care for were Ms. Found in a Bottle, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and The Gold Bug.

I love the way Poe wrote. Very immersive, captivating, and relatable. In the afterword, Peter Glassman perfectly explains, "...it is his understanding of the basic and universal fears of all men and women, regardless of time or place, that will enable his tales to endure forever."

[Johnny · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I picked up this book, it was intended to be a reread. But I realized very quickly that there were a number of stories in this collection I had never read.

What can one say about Poe? Each time I approach his work, I walk away with something else. While not associated with humorous writing, I found many of these stories to be very funny. Dark in theme, but farcical as well.

The Eichenberg illustrations are absolutely gorgeous. If you have a chance to find this edition in a bookstore, take a look.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic wood engravings by Fritz Eichenberg truly enhance the stories. Our family has owned this book for almost 70 years.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this in my quest to round out the list of things I should have read but never did. All the classics are here, some of which I did read in junior high, as well as other, lesser works. The gothic stuff is the best, the science fiction is painful. The mysteries are fine enough, a bit simplistic and too pat. Clearly, though, Poe was an innovator in a number of fields, and much of his work still holds up today.

[Carlos West · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why choose this volume over others? The wood engravings, of course! There is a nice intro by Hervey Allen(who in 1926 wrote a full biography of Poe) about the aftermath of Edgar’s works. Are there any poems in this volume? Yes and no. There are no individual poems(which is a shame, one or two could have been included) but there are poems incorporated in the stories. The tales included are of mystery, satire and humor, but mostly horror. The Hans Pfaall story many will find boring, although you can see the manuscript at the Morgan Library in NYC. Much of the well known stories are here. The Balloon Hoax (&) Never Bet the Devil Your Head is not here. The paper quality is excellent. Since Poe revised some of his works, you will see some differences here in comparisom with other volumes. Some sentences are in italics whereas in other volumes they are in caps. Some Greek letters are different. One big typo on page 377: “Now here yet?” should be “Not here yet”. You also might want to read, The Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, published by Doubleday in 1966. That edition also includes a novel by Poe and a brief biography.

[Jacob Cleaver · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would highly recommend all of Poes horror stories. He is truly a master in this regard. Stories like “The Pit and the Pendulum” and “The Cask of Amontillado” we’re some of the best horror I had ever read. I also really enjoyed his short stories about storms and the sea such as “A descent into the Maelstrom” or “MS. Found in a Bottle”.

However, I found his mysteries and sci-fi stories to be an absolute slog to get through. I would not urge anyone to read them and am happy to never have to read them again.

Overall the stories were certainly a worthy read but I would urge readers to skip many of the aforementioned mysteries and scifi-ish short stories if you find you are getting bored with them. They simply weren’t worth the read for me.

[Critterbee❇ · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of brilliant works by Edgar Allan Poe. I recently visited the amazing Poe House in Richmond, Virginia, and thought it was time for a refresher of his works. He wrote horror, he basically invented detective fiction, he was brilliant, and he sure was eccentric.

If you like the original Sherlock Holmes mysteries, you have to read the three C. Auguste Dupin mysteries included in Tales of Edgar Allan Poe. Dupin is mentioned in Arthur Conan Doyle's 'A Study in Scarlet,' and Sherlock Holmes is very reminiscent of Dupin.

I prefer the mysteries to the horror stories, because, basically I am too easily creeped out. Those who love the crazy scary creepy tales will enjoy this book as well.

[Tyler Thiel · Rating 3 out of 5]

A series of short stories, I recommend reading one and letting it sit with you for a few days. Don’t rush through to the end as it won’t have the desired effect. Some of these stories can be especially spooky if, like me, being buried alive is horrifying, some are eh. Overall though the writing and word choice seems a bit too polished, and honestly takes a bit of the freight out of the stories. Good enough for a spooky October book.

[Hayley Shaver · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book very much I especially loved the illustrations, as they gave more life to the tales in the book. I loved the genius shown by Poe in the Tell-Tale Heart, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and The Fall of the House of Usher. If you like macabre and mystery tales, this book is for you.

[Martin Bihl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps not the greatest anthology of Poe, but worth reading because it features many lesser known stories, giving you a fascinating overview of this remarkably imaginative, if uneven, writer.

[Klgg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another childhood favorite.

[Kat · Rating 4 out of 5]

First time reading any Poe, and I think he is just brilliant. Definitely dark and little deranged, but nonetheless brilliant. My favorites so far are 'The Black Cat' and 'The Pit and the Pendulum'.

[J. Bryce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice 1944 edition of this classic collection, includes 27 "tales," and wonderful engraved illustrations by Fritz Eichenberg.

[Jake · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have wanted to read this for a number of years and finally got around to it. Interesting but a bit of tough slogging through some very wordy prose.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent engraved illustrations by Fritz Eichenburg but I'm still not a big fan of most of Poe's stories.

[malaya perushek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Descent into the Maelstrom and Berenice my favorites