Edgar Allan Poe is known by a vast majority of people in today’s society, but why? Poe has become so popular that he is a major influence, or reference source, of today’s writers. He is read everywhere around the world, taught in English classes in not only middle school and high school, but college as well. William T. Bandy states that “...he has been more widely read over the years than any other author born into the Western Hemisphere”(2, Bandy). It is obvious to say that Poe has most definitely made a name for himself over the past century, but how exactly has Edgar Allan Poe affected Literature since his death in 1849?
Poe has been known to have some of the darkest and most engrossing poems ever written. J. Lasley …show more content…
Many of his poems refer to his wife Victoria Eliza Clemm Poe who died in 1847 by tuberculosis. He would change her name in the poems and talk about how much he misses her and wants her to come back to him. Poe became very depressed after Victoria died and this changed the way he wrote. His poems have always been dark and mysterious but after she died they became all about her and how he wanted her back. Authors recognized this and some have also used this type of writing style after their loved one has passed. It was a very different type of writing that not many people had seen since Shakespeare’s writing but it has become some of Poe’s most popular poems. Poe’s works have caused many debates as stated by Lois Davis Vines in his book “Poe Abroad: Influence Reputation Affinities”. He says in the first chapter that “In the twentieth century he had inspired psychoanalytic studies, literary debates, and a work by the new novelist Michel Butor”(9, Vines). Vines also says that “Poe played a major role in the development of Symbolism, the short story, the pseudoscientific novel, and the detective genre in