Edgar Allen Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts on January 19, 1809. His father, David Poe, was from a Baltimore family. He was an actor barely making a living and a heavy drinker. Poe's mother, Elizabeth Arnold Poe, was also in the acting business. She became a widow at the age of eighteen. Two years after his birth, she died of tuberculosis. When his mother died, Poe was adopted by John Allen. Edgar had gotten his middle name from him. His brother and younger sister were sent off to two different families. In 1815, John Allen moved his family to England. While there, Poe was sent to private schools. After living in England for several years, the Allen's moved back to Richmond, Virginia.

When Poe reached his teenage years, tensions developed between Mr. Allen and himself. The Allen's were very wealthy, but Mr. Allen disapproved of Edgar's actions, so he decided that he would not inherit any of the

The Tell-Tale Heart was also a short story published in 1843. The story is told in the first-person by the killer himself, who has been locked up in either an insane asylum or a prison for the crime he committed. He begins by arguing that he is not insane and that the way the he killed the old man was the sensible way to do it. He explains to the reader that he loved the old man, but not his "evil eye." He says that when the eye fell on him, his blood ran cold, so he decided to kill the man and rid himself of the eye forever. So the narrator kills the old man, dismembers all of his body parts in the bathtub, and sticks the remains under the floorboards. Afterwards, the police come to check on a scream that has been reported to them. The narrator explains that he keeps hearing the old mans heart beating, but in reality, it is his own. By the end of the story, the narrator gives himself away to the police, which were sitting right on top of the floorboards where the body was hi!

family's wealth. In the spring of 1826, Poe entered the University of Virginia. John Allen did not support his tuition well enough, so Poe turned to gambling to get money. Finally, after months of disputes, Poe left the Allen's home and went out on his own.

The general types of works that Edgar Allen Poe wrote were mainly short stories and some poems. Poe was the first writer to recognize that the short story was a different kind of fiction than the novel and the first to insist that, for a story to have a powerful effect on the reader, every single detail in the story should contribute to that effect (Magill 1643).

Poe had developed short-fiction as a genre that ended up having a major impact on American Literature and publishing throughout the 19th century (Magill 1810). His stories and criticism have been models and guides for writers in this characteristically American genre up to the present time (Magill 1810). The evidence in this report made me come to the conclusion that Edgar Allen

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