In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart", the narrator tries to prove his sanity after murdering an elderly man because of his "vulture eye". His growing guilt leads him to hear the old man's heart beating under the floorboards, which drives him to confess the crime to the police.
The Tell-Tale Heart strips away myths that have grown up around the life of Edgar Allen Poe, providing a fresh assessment of the man and his work. Symons reveals Poe as his contemporaries saw him – a man struggling to make a living and whose life was beset by tragedy, such that he was driven to excessive drinking and unhealthy relationships.
A new selection for the NEA’s Big Read program A compact selection of Poe’s greatest stories and poems, chosen by the National Endowment for the Arts for their Big Read program. This selection of eleven stories and seven poems contains such famously chilling masterpieces of the storyteller’s art as “The Tell-tale Heart,” “The Fall of the House of Usher,” “The Cask of Amontillado,” and “The Pit and the Pendulum,” and such unforgettable poems as “The Raven,” “The Bells,” and “Annabel Lee.” Poe is widely credited with pioneering the detective story, represented here by “The Purloined Letter,” “The Mystery of Marie Roget,” and “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Also included is his essay “The Philosophy of Composition,” in which he lays out his theory of how good writers write, describing how he constructed “The Raven” as an example.
This Prestwick House Literary Touchstone Classic? includes a glossary and reader's notes to help the modern reader contend with Poe's allusions and complicated vocabulary.Edgar Allan Poe'his name conjures up thoughts of hearts beating long after their owners are dead, of disease and plague amid wealth, of love that extends beyond the grave, and of black ravens who utter only one word. The richness of Poe's writing, however, includes much more than horror, loss, and death.Alive with hypnotic sounds and mesmerizing rhythms, his poetry captures both the splendor and devastation of love, life, and death. His stories teem with irony and black humor, in addition to plot twists and surprise endings. Living by their own rules and charged with passion, Poe's characters are instantly recognizable'even though we may be appalled by their actions, we understand their motivations.The thirty-three selections in The Best of Poe highlight his unique qualities. Discover for yourself the mysterious allure and genius of Edgar Allan Poe, who remains one of America's most popular and important authors, even more than 150 years after his death.
An illustrated collection of some of Poe's sinister tales, including "The Black Cat, " "The Fall of the House of Usher, " "The Premature Burial, " and a few of his poems.
Stories of lost love, lost ways . . . and lost minds! Gris Grimly’s mysterious, morbid, and macabre illustrations capture four Poe classics with an unmatchable ghoulish charm. This second installment of illustrated Poe tales, a companion to Edgar Allan Poe’s Tales of Mystery and Madness, includes the perennial favorite The Tell Tale Heart, as well as The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether, The Oblong Box, and The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar. With little trimming and lots of gory visuals, these stories have never looked better or more frightening!
This collection of sixteen short stories includes some of Edgar Allan Poe's most boundary-pushing and blood-chilling work. Selections range from "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," which launched the detective mystery genre, to "The Tell-Tale Heart," a Gothic classic about a murderer's overwhelming guilt. Discover tales of creatures that return from the dead, ghastly diseases that claim their victims within half an hour, and secret messages that lead to buried treasure. This curated compilation contains unabridged versions of the American author's finest tales; the short stories were originally published between 1832 and 1849.