Status Updates From Selected Tales

The Fall of the House of Usher: the best of the short stories so far!

The Man who was Used Up: Classic authors go out of their way to use slurs. They *have* to write in a black character whose only purpose is to be called the n-word. Okay, cousinfucker, thanks for that.

Ligeia: This anthology is giving an endless parade of just... young women dying: Berenice, Morella, then Ligeia. Surely this isn't all Poe wrote about? I think these should have been spaced out through the collection.

Morella:I feel as if I’m forcing myself to like these more than I’m actually enjoying them. I really enjoy Poe’s style on a linguistic level but the substance is leaving something to be desired. Hoping later stories change my mind!

Berenicë: very creepy! slow dawning horror at the end. bizarre enough to stay in the memory.
the relationship between Berenicë and Egaeus (cousins, one ☠️ early) lowkey foreshadowed his own relationship with his cousin childbride??

First story:
MS Found in a Bottle - Poe’s poeticism and control of language is always phenomenal but the story wasn’t too gripping. After Googling, it seems it includes a lot of references which I wasn’t familiar with/knowledge I was unaware of and therefore couldn’t connect to it.

Edgar Allan Poe starting a sentence with "Indeed" is enough to prove me that expression ecrite is bullshit

Read ‘The Murders in Rue Morgue’, ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’, and ‘The Purloined Letter’.

‘The Murders in Rue Morgue’ - The we sallied forth into the streets, arm in arm, continuing the topics of the day, or roaming far and wide until a late hour, seeking, amid the wild lights and shadows of the populous city [Paris], that infinity of mental excitement which quiet observation can afford.’