He is fond of enigmas, of conundrums, hieroglyphics; exhibiting in his solutions of each a degree of acumen which appears to the ordinary apprehension praeternatural.

'Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was a groan of mortal terror... the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul.' Stories about murder, mystery and madness, portraying the author's feverish imagination at its creative height. Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th-century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions. Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849). Poe's works available in Penguin Classics are The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Writings, The Masque of the Red Death, The Murders in the Rue Morgue and Other Tales, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Portable Edgar Allan Poe and The Science Fiction of Edgar Allan Poe.

The Essential Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, by Edgar Allan Poe, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics New introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriate. All editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. Barnes & Noble Classics pulls together a constellation of influences — biographical, historical, and literary — to enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works. Creator of the modern detective story, innovative architect of the horror genre, and a poet of extraordinary musicality, Edgar Allan Poe remains one of America's most popular and influential writers. His tales and poems brim with psychological depth, almost painful intensity, and unexpected — and surprisingly modern — flashes of dark humor and irony. This anthology offers an exceptionally generous selection of Poe's short stories. It includes his famed masterpieces, such as The Murders in the Rue Morgue and The Purloined Letter, featuring Poe's great detective, Dupin; his insightful studies of madness The Black Cat and The Tell-Tale Heart; The Gold-Bug, his delightful exercise in code-breaking; and important but lesser-known tales, such as Bon-Bon, The Assignation, and King Pest. Also included are some of Poe's most beloved poems, haunting lyrics of love and loss, such as Annabel Lee, nightmare phantasmagories such as The Raven, and his grand experiment in translating sound into words, The Bells. Benjamin F. Fisher, Professor of English, University of Mississippi, is a longtime enthusiast of the works of Poe. He has published books, articles, and notes about Poe, and in American, Victorian, and Gothic studies, and serves on editorial boards for several professional journals. He has also been acclaimed for outstanding teaching.

«With this marvelously illustrated and popularly priced volume, readers can appreciate the full range of Poe's genius. Images reproduced from a variety of sources (including Aubrey Beardsley, Édouard Manet, and Arthur Rackham) enhance the mood of such favorites as «The Fall of the House of Usher,» «The Cask of Amontillado,» «The Tell-Tale Heart,» «The Purloined Letter,» and «The Masque of the Red Death.»

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics. 'Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart — one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which gives direction to the character of Man.' Including Poe's most terrifying, grotesque and haunting short stories, Tales of Mystery and Imagination is the ultimate collection of the infamous author's macabre works. Considered to be one of the earliest American writers to encapsulate the genre of detective-fiction, the collection features some of his most popular tales.'The Gold-Bug' is the only tale that was popular in his lifetime, whereas 'The Black Cat', 'The Pit and the Pendulum' and 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' became more widely read after his death. Focussing on the internal conflict of individuals, the power of the dead over the living, and psychological explorations of darker human emotion that appear to anticipate Sigmund Freud's later theories on the psyche, Poe's Gothic terror stories are considered masterpieces the world over.

Stories to send shivers down the spine from the master of horror.

«The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym» is an archetypal American story of escape from home and family which traces a young man's rite of passage through a series of terrible brushes with death during a fateful sea voyage. But it also goes much deeper, as Pym encounters various interpretative dilemmas, at last leaving the reader with a broken-off ending that defies solution. Apart from its violence and mystery, the tale calls attention to the act of writing and to the problem of representing truth. Layer upon layer of elaborate hoaxes include its author's own role of posing as ghost-writer of the narrative; «Pym» — his only novel — has become the key text for our understanding of Poe. This edition offers eight short tales which are linked to «Pym» by their treatment of persistent themes — fantastic voyages, gigantic whirlpools, and premature burials — or by their ironic commentary on Poe's mystification of his readers.»

The human mind is a dark, bottomless pit, and sometimes it works in strange and frightening ways. That sound in the night... is it a door banging in the wind, or a murdered man knocking inside his coffin? The face in the mirror... is it yours, or the face of someone standing behind you, who is never there when you turn round? These famous short stories by Edgar Allan Poe, that master of horror, explore the dark world of the imagination, where the dead live and speak, where fear lies in every shadow of the mind...

The room was on the fourth floor, and the door was locked — with the key on the inside. The windows were closed and fastened — on the inside. The chimney was too narrow for a cat to get through. So how did the murderer escape? And whose were the two angry voices heard by the neighbours as they ran up the stairs? Nobody in Paris could find any answers to this mystery. Except Auguste Dupin, who could see further and think more clearly than other people. The answers to the mystery were all there, but only a clever man could see them.

Are you brave enough to read four of Poe’s famous horror stories? Edgar Allan Poe wrote strange stories about terrible people and evil crimes. Don’t read this book late at night!

There are five stories in this book. The Fall of the House of Usher' and The Barrel of Amontillado' are stories of madness; The Maelstrom' describes fear of death during a storm on the ocean; and in The Murders of the Rue Morgue' and The Stolen Letter' meet C. Auguste Dupin, Poe's famous Parisian detective.

Everybody has bad dreams. Horrible things move towards you in the dark, things you can hear but not see. Then you wake up, in your own warm bed, and turn over to go back to sleep. But imagine that you wake up on a hard floor, in a darkness blacker than the blackest night. You listen to the silence, and smell a wet dead smell. Death is all around you, waiting... In these stories by Edgar Allan Poe, death whispers at you from every dark corner, and fear can send you mad...

Seven intriguing stories by one of the most famous and gifted writers of nineteenth century American literature.

Edgar Allan Poe, the father of the detective story' and a master of horror, is one of the greatest American short story writers. In these stories we meet people struggling with fear, revenge, mental illness and death. Which of them will win and which will lose their battles?

This collection brings together some of the best examples of late nineteenth and early twentieth-century short stories. Some are about ordinary people to whom something unexpected happens. Others are about unusual characters or events. Some of the stories are funny and others are more serious. All of them are highly enjoyable.

There are five stories in this book. The Fall of the House of Usher' and The Barrel of Amontillado' are stories of madness; The Maelstrom' describes fear of death during a storm on the ocean; and in The Murders of the Rue Morgue' and The Stolen Letter' meet C. Auguste Dupin, Poe's famous Parisian detective.

From the exquisite lyric “To Helen”, to the immortal masterpieces “Annabel Lee”, “The Bells”, and “The Raven”, The Complete Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe demonstrates the author’s gift for the form.

«This book features an Introduction by John S. Whitley, University of Sussex. This collection of Poe's best stories contains all the terrifying and bewildering tales that characterize his work. As well as the Gothic horror of such famous stories as «The Pit and the Pendulum», «The Fall of the House of Usher», «The Premature Burial» and «The Tell-Tale Heart», all of Poe's Auguste Dupin stories are included. These are the first modern detective stories and include «The Murders in the Rue Morgue», «The Mystery of Marie Roget» and «The Purloined Letter».»

Since their first publication in the 1830s and 1840s, Edgar Allan Poe's extraordinary Gothic tales have established themselves as classics of horror fiction and have also created many of the conventions which still dominate the genre of detective fiction. Yet, as well as being highly enjoyable, Poe's tales are works of very real intellectual exploration. Abandoning the criteria of characterization and plotting in favour of blurred boundaries between self and other, will and morality, identity and memory, Poe uses the Gothic to question the integrity of human existence. Indeed, Poe is less interested in solving puzzles or in moral retribution than in exposing the misconceptions that make things seem 'mysterious' in the first place. Attentive to the historical and political dimensions of these very American tales, this new critical edition selects twenty-four tales and places the most popular — 'The Fall of the House of Usher', 'The Masque of the Red Death', 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue; and 'The Purloined Letter' — alongside less well-known Top page travel narratives, metaphysical essays and political satires.

This selection of Poe's critical writings, short fiction and poetry demonstrates an intense interest in aesthetic issues and the astonishing power and imagination with which he probed the darkest corners of the human mind.