For our Halloween episode, we explore the strange death of the master of the macabre himself, Edgar Allan Poe.

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Cassandra Harold is your host. EM Hilker is our principal writer and researcher with additional writing by Cassandra Harold.

Jim Harold is our Executive Producer.

Unpleasant Dreams is a production of Jim Harold Media.

You can find EM Hilker's original article HERE

PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

There is much that can be said about Edgar Allan Poe, but in terms of his literary habits, little that needs to be. Much more famous in death than he was in life, he was nevertheless a literary critic of some renown in his own time. His true love, however, was lurid, ghastly fiction. Poe unknowingly fathered the genre of detective fiction, through his tales of C. Auguste Dupin. The most well-known Dupin story was The Murders in the Rue Morgue, which served to set the stage for Sherlock Holmes and his ilk. He is best known now for his gothic fiction, morbid tales filled with crumbling stone castles and candle-lit catacombs, of demonic foes and bitter sweet revenge. He brought us The Raven, Hop-Frog, The Fall of the House of Usher. The creative mind of Poe was deep and dark and mysterious as a night ocean. 

… but little is so mysterious as Poe’s own death....

FIND THE REMAINDER OF THE TRANSCRIPT HERE

SOURCES – FURTHER READING

Anon. “Poe’s Death Theories.” Poe’s Death | Edgar Allan Poe Museum | Richmond, VA, www.poemuseum.org/poes-death. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021

Birch, Doug. “The Passing of Poe: What Really Happened to the Master of the Macabre in the Days Leading up to His Death Here 145 Years Ago?” Baltimoresun.com, 24 Oct. 2018, www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1994-10-02-1994275208-story.html. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021

Edgar Allan Poe: A Life from Beginning to End. Hourly History, 2018. Kindle ed.

Eschner, Kat. “Who Was the Poe Toaster? We Still Have No Idea.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 19 Jan. 2017, www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/who-was-poe-toaster-we-still-have-no-idea-180961820/. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021 

Geiling, Natasha. “The (Still) Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 7 Oct. 2014, www.smithsonianmag.com/history/still-mysterious-death-edgar-allan-poe-180952936. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021

Kay, Liz F. “Poe Toaster Tribute Is ‘Nevermore’.” Baltimoresun.com, 9 Dec. 2018, www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/bs-xpm-2010-01-19-bal-poe0119-story.html. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021.

Lovejoy, Bess. Rest in Pieces. Simon and Schuster, 2013.

Miller, John C. ‘The Exhumations and Reburials of Edgar and Virginia Poe and Mrs. Clemm,” Poe Studies, Dec. 1974, Vol. Vii, No. 27: 46-4, www.eapoe.org/pstudies/ps1970/p1974204.htm. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021

Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allen Poe: His Life and Legacy. Cooper Square Press, 2000.

Pruitt, Sarah. “The Riddle of Edgar Allan Poe’s Death.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 26 Oct. 2015, www.history.com/news/how-did-edgar-allan-poe-die. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021.

Semtner, Christopher P. “13 Haunting Facts About Edgar Allan Poe’s Death.” Biography.com, A&E Networks Television, 13 Jan. 2021, www.biography.com/news/edgar-allan-poe-death-facts. Retrieved 5 Sept. 2021.

Walsh, John Evangelist. Midnight Dreary: The Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe. St. Martin’s Griffin, 2000. 

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