What were Edgar Allan Poe's beliefs?

-- Anonymous, October 10, 2004

Answers

What were his beliefs? That would probably be unknowable, even to him. At times he espoused atheism, though on his death bed he was reported to have said something like, "Lord have mercy on my soul." He believed that the most poetic image was that of a beautiful woman dying young and many of his writings concerned this. Both his mother and his wife died of consumption (tuberculosis) at early ages. I think the loss of his parents at an early age contributed more than anything to the kind of psychological problems that hampered him his whole life. Mr. Poe was a romantic who created worlds that had little in common with the harsh reality that surrounded him. His writings have a timelessness and universality for that very reason. He was also a merciless critic who often wrote scathing reviews of other writers' works. In short, he was a tormented genius who had quite a few hangups. Heh heh Ah, Poe. Ah, humanity.

-- Anonymous, October 12, 2004

Like many of the cultured of his day Poe was likely a Deist, a loosely unaffiliated Christian. His stay at the Jesuit Fordham University was a warm experience. His Marian poem inspired by prayer services probably as it touched him in that personal and muse area of his life concerning the female influences in his life and his sorrows. His whole belief and being was probably more focused upon his perosnal experience and philosophy than any of his contemporaries. At best he did not, or could not, rely on the afterlife answers of faith nor any faith answers to life's tragedies.

"Eureka" shows his search for a personal all encompassing answer to life that does not cling to brahmin transcendentalism, Christianity or even science. He may cry out or rebel, but there is little soothing sureness when he sees all he values slip away yet their memories continue to haunt him. read "Eureka" at www.eapoe.org. this is probably as close as Poe gets to including a religious dimension in his life and work.

-- Anonymous, October 13, 2004

Poe's belief was that he would leave this life without being known. His life was a drere, a bore, a big nothing until he met Lenore. But shortly after she died, he began to go to his old ways and began to mope around.his poetry always felt to be sad but yet you would always get an important message from it.

-- Anonymous, October 15, 2004

he belived that bijan had a big dick

-- Anonymous, November 18, 2004