Edgar Allan Poe

Of course, you can guess I have chosen Edgar Allan Poe.Why?Because his stories had a great influence in my life when I was younger. I can keep reading his stories and remain intrigued. This famous writer’s most famous work is surprisingly a poet title “The Raven”. Catching a glimpse of it and reading through briefly, I was amazed by the sheer length of the poem! I admit I have not read much poems but I seriously think that 18 verses is really long.What I believe is that the way he writes his intriguing stories is mainly caused by his difficult childhood. This is because his father had left his family not long after he was born and his mother died shortly after. He was then taken into the family of John Allan,who never formally accepted him. His live was not exactly pleasant either. He and his foster family did not get along well. He spent the next few years studying under private tutors at the residence of Mr. John Allan. He then studied at the University of Virginia which he remained for less than a year.

In 1833 Poe won two prizes of $100 each for a tale in prose, and for a poem. John P. Kennedy, one of the committee who made the award, now gave him means of support, and secured employment for him as editor of the "Southern Literary Messenger" at Richmond. After a short but successful editorial work on "The Messenger," his old habits returned, he quarrelled with his publishers and was dismissed. While in Richmond he married his first cousin, Virginia Clem, and in January, 1837, removed to New York. Here he gained a poor support by writing for periodicals
His literary work may be summed up as follows: In 1838 appeared a fiction entitled "The Narrative of Arthur Gorden Pym;" 1839, editor of Burton's "Gentleman's Magazine," Philadelphia; next, editor of "Graham's Magazine;" 1840, "Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque," in two volumes; 1845, "The Raven," published by the "American Review;" then sub-editor of the "Mirror" under employment of N. P. Willis and Geo. P. Norris; next associate editor of the "Broadway Journal." His wife died in 1848. His poverty was now such that the press made appeals to the public for his support. In 1848 he published "Eureka, a Prose Poem."
He is considered to be one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre. He is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of Science fiction.(Coincidentelly,my favorite genre is science fiction(stories such as artimis fowl), followed by detective fiction(stories such as Sherlock Holmes)) He was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living through writing alone, resulting in a financially difficult life and career.