Edgar Allen Poe is certainly one of the darkest authors that American literature can lay claim to. He is also one of the most interesting to read because he explores areas of the human condition that many authors are unwilling or unable to explore. The mere mention of his name will conjure up in the minds of many literature lovers images of murders, madmen, women returning from the dead and terrifying events such as premature burials (Poe...). is that it gave Mr. Poe the ability to conjure up such dark thoughts and furthermore to put them on paper What was his story Edgar Allen Poe was born in Boston on January 19, 1809 a pair of traveling actors , was not the only talented writer in the family. His older brother William Henry Leonard Poe was also a poet of note before his untimely death, and his sister Rosalie Poe became a teacher at the Richmond girls' school calligraphy (Poe's...). To add to the strangeness of Mr. Poe's life, his parents both died within three years of his birth, leading him to be raised by a wealthy tobacco merchant named John Allan and his wife Francis Valentine Allan. Unfortunately, this also marked the time the family would be split up, as Mr. Poe's brother and sister were sent to live with another family. Mr. Allan's intentions were for Mr. Poe to grow up as a businessman and to follow in his footsteps, however Mr. Poe aspired to become a writer from an early age, and like the handwriting on the back of the various protrusions of the Allan the family business would prove that Mr. Poe had little to no interest in the tobacco business (Poe's...). By the time Mr. Poe reached thirteen, he had collected enough works to... middle of paper... Emical research completed. Web 10 April 2011. Kunjundzic, Dragan. “The Phantom of Representation, or the Masque of the Red Death.” Art Journal 49.1 (1990): 52-58. Academic research completed.Web. April 10, 2011"The Life of Poe | Edgar Allan Poe Museum." Edgar Allan Poe Museum: Poe's Life, Legacy, and Works: Richmond, Virginia. Network. April 9, 2011. .Slick, Richard D. "Poe's Masque of the Red Death." Explainer 47.2 (1989): 23-29. Academic research completed.Web April 5, 2011Vora, Setu K., and Sundaram V. Ramanan. “Ebola-Poe: A Modern Parallel of the Red Death?” Emerging Infectious Diseases 8.12 (2002): 1521-524. Academic research completed.Web. April 13, 2011 Grano, Patricia H. "The Mask of Indifference in 'The Masque of the Red Death'" Studies in Short Fiction 19.1 (1982): 51-57. Academic research completed.Web. April 11th, 2011