How was Edgar Alen Poe was an example of writers in the Dark Romantic Period

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2002

Answers

Wrote under the Byron model in his early poetry, also Shelley and Coleridge. Coleridge influence can be seen in his novel, sea stories, theorietical poetics and philosophical analysis within both essays and stories. Elements of the gothic in his horor tales of course. The Byronic hero is less a pose than a personal empathy for Poe, the lonely genius.

Now for actual content, take any introduction of a dark story where the hero is a moody, wandering loner who is seeking out wastelands, fearful adventures, tragedy and melancholy. The breaking of boundaries for new emotional and metaphysical perceptions that can barely be represented, definitely outside the orderly classical model. But for Poe reason grapples with the demons, the chaotic wildness with a fundamental, American belief in progress and science. Yes, optimism AND criticism of the ills of too much rapid urbanization and irrationally applied science. Though he loves nature and tells wild tales he does not eulogize nature overmuch in any flowery, descriptive emphasis. The focus is on the individual response, on the poet. Nor does he actually use much of the supernatural and that often ambiguous and neutral to create the mood of the areas just beyond the normal present reality. Melancholy is a popular theme for Poe. More but I am out of available time.

-- Anonymous, April 06, 2002