Edgar Allan Poe was born on January 19th, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts. Poe’s parents were David Poe and Elizabeth Arnold Poe, an actor and actress that worked in the city of Baltimore (Britannica). Shortly after Poe’s birth, his father abandoned the family and left Poe and his mother to fend for themselves. In 1811 when Poe was two his mother died. That left him with his second depressing loss in only his first two years of life (540). After his father ran off and his mother’s sudden death, Poe was left with his godfather, John Allan. John Allan was a wealthy merchant based in Richmond, Virginia with the means, knowledge, and affluence to provide a good life for Poe. Poe enrolled at the University of Virginia in 1826 (Britannica). For the first time in his life things were starting to go well. Upon entering college it took Poe no more time

Despite the overwhelming pain that Poe felt, do to the death of his wife he was still able to find relief. Poe belied death should not be feared, but instead it should be sought (Quinn 137). For Poe when Virginia died she escaped the curse of life. Poe met up with his former sweetheart, Sarah Elmira Royster and became engaged shortly there after. Just days before Poe’s wedding, he made a stop in Baltimore and just disappeared. On October 3rd, 1849, Poe was found lying in a side street anesthetized (World Book). Edgar Allan Poe died on October 7th, 1849 (Britannica). The cause of his death has remained a mystery.

Virginia Clemm Poe’s wife died in 1847 of tuberculosis and in doing so shattered his heart again (World Book). Virginia ‘s death had affected Poe much more than any other loss had up to this point in his life. Poe was once quoted saying:

“Each time I felt all the agonies of her death—and at each accession of the disorder I loved her more dearly and clung to her life with more desperate pertinacity. But I am constitutionally sensitive—nervous in a very unusual degree. During these fits of absolute unconsciously I drank, God only knows how often or how much.” (Buranelli 38)

All of Poe’s works have a link to his own life’s stories and the events that transpired in it. Sometime in Poe life he learned that a good story possesses real life events and those events are what gave his stories such strong emotions. Poe wrote a passage in his story of “Marginalia” that could only apply to a person such as himself: “I have sometimes amused myself by endeavoring

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