Editing Edgar Allan Poe (section)

==Literary style and themes==
=== Genres ===
Poe's best-known fiction works have been labeled as [[Gothic fiction|Gothic]] horror,{{sfn|Meyers|1992|p=64}} and adhere to that genre's general propensity to appeal to the public's taste for the terrifying or psychologically intimidating.<ref name="Royot57">{{harvnb|Royot|2002|p=57}}</ref> His most recurrent themes seem to deal with death. The physical signs indicating death, the nature of [[decomposition]], the popular concerns of Poe's day about [[premature burial]], the reanimation of the dead, are all at length explored in his more notable works.{{sfn|Kennedy|1987|p=3}} Many of his writings are generally considered to be part of the [[dark romanticism]] genre, which is said to be a literary reaction to [[transcendentalism]],{{sfn|Koster|2002|p=336}} which Poe strongly criticized.<ref name="ljunquist15">{{harvnb|Ljunquist|2002|p=15}}</ref> He referred to followers of the transcendental movement, including Emerson, as "Frog-Pondians", after the pond on [[Boston Common]],{{sfn|Royot|2002|pp=61–62}}<ref>{{cite web|title=(Introduction)|url=http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/english/poebostonexhibit/|work=The Raven in the Frog Pond: Edgar Allan Poe and the City of Boston|publisher=The Trustees of Boston College|access-date=May 26, 2012|format=Exhibition at Boston Public Library|date=March 31, 2010|archive-date=February 3, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170203065247/http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/english/poebostonexhibit/|url-status=dead}}</ref> and ridiculed their writings as "metaphor—run mad,"{{sfn|Hayes|2002|p=16}} lapsing into "obscurity for obscurity's sake" or "mysticism for mysticism's sake".<ref name="ljunquist15" /> However, Poe once wrote in a letter to [[Thomas Holley Chivers]] that he did not dislike transcendentalists, "only the pretenders and [[Sophist#Modern usage|sophists]] among them".{{sfn|Silverman|1991|p=169}}

Beyond the horror stories he is most famous for, Poe also wrote a number of [[satire]]s, humor tales, and hoaxes. He was a master of sarcasm. For comic effect, he often used irony and ludicrous extravagance in a deliberate attempt to liberate the reader from cultural and literary conformity.<ref name=Royot57/> "[[Metzengerstein]]" is the first story that Poe is known to have published,{{sfn|Silverman|1991|p=88}} and his first foray into horror, but it was originally intended as a [[burlesque]] satirizing the popular genres of Poe's time.{{sfn|Fisher|1993|pp=142, 149}} Poe was also one of the forerunners of American [[science fiction]], responding in his voluminous writing to such emerging literary trends as the explorations into the possibilities of hot air balloons as featured in such works as, "[[The Balloon-Hoax]]".{{sfn|Tresch|2002|p=114}}

Much of Poe's work coincided with themes that readers of his day found appealing, though he often professed to abhor the tastes of the majority of the people who read for pleasure in his time. In his critical works, Poe investigated and wrote about many [[pseudoscience|of the pseudoscience]]s that were then popular with the majority of his fellow Americans. They included, but were not limited to, the fields of astrology, cosmology, [[phrenology]],{{sfn|Hungerford|1930|pp=209–231}}<ref name= Stern1968>{{cite journal | vauthors = Stern MB|title= Poe: "The Mental Temperament" for phrenologists |journal= Am Lit |date= 1968 | volume = 40| issue = 2|pages=155-163|doi=
|PMID=19943371 |jstor=2923658 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2923658|url-access=subscription}}</ref> and [[physiognomy]].{{sfn|Grayson|2005|pp=56–77}}

===Literary theory===
Poe's writings often reflect the literary theories he introduced in his prolific critical works and expounded on in such essays as, "[[The Poetic Principle]]".<ref name=Krutch225>{{harvnb|Krutch|1926|p=225}}</ref> He disliked [[didacticism]]{{sfn|Kagle|1990|p=104}} and imitation masquerading as influence, believing originality to be the highest mark of genius. In Poe's conception of the artist's life, the attainment of the concretization of beauty should be the ultimate goal. That which is unique is alone of value. Works with obvious meanings, he wrote, cease to be art.{{sfn|Wilbur|1967|p=99}} He believed that any work worthy of being praised should have as its focus a single specific effect.<ref name=Krutch225/> That which does not tend towards the effect is extraneous. In his view, every serious writer must carefully calculate each sentiment and idea in his or her work to ensure that it strengthens the theme of the piece.{{sfn|Jannaccone|1974|p=3}}

Poe describes the method he employed while composing his most famous poem, "The Raven", in an essay entitled "[[The Philosophy of Composition]]". However, many of Poe's critics have questioned whether the method enunciated in the essay was formulated before the poem was written, or afterward, or, as [[T.&nbsp;S. Eliot]] is quoted as saying, "It is difficult for us to read that essay without reflecting that if Poe plotted out his poem with such calculation, he might have taken a little more pains over it: the result hardly does credit to the method."{{sfn|Hoffman|1998|p=76}} Biographer Joseph Wood Krutch described the essay as "a rather highly ingenious exercise in the art of rationalization".{{sfn|Krutch|1926|p=98}}