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<\/a><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nI liked every single story exceptionally well. What\u2019s remarkable is the constant second layer of meaning\u2014the depth and complexity inherent in these tales. On the surface, they are horror stories that tap into fundamental human fears: being buried alive, death itself, mysterious diseases, and again and again the supernatural. Yet each story is also designed to allow wide interpretive scope, so alongside the Gothic element there\u2019s always something deeper to discover. For example, that fear can become a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. Or that it is simply impossible to hide from a pandemic\u2014something that resonates strikingly with our experience of COVID.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Poe writes with suspense, and thanks to the frequent first-person perspective the reader is always very close to the narrator. You empathize and can readily follow the narrator\u2019s thoughts, which lends the stories even more authenticity. You\u2019re taken into confidence, handed an experience, and you can\u2019t help but want to know where it leads. I constantly felt the curiosity to find out how each story would end\u2014and that pulled me through the collection.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
On top of that, Poe\u2019s language is simply wonderful. The style is consistently refined, with beautiful sentences and a polished diction that\u2019s just a pleasure to read\u2014the kind you really only find in truly great classics. In contemporary books, that high level is extremely rare. I really savored it. You can tell you\u2019re dealing with an educated and very alert mind, and it\u2019s all the nicer to be taken into his confidence.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n I love the combination of a book and an Arte documentary, and luckily there was an excellent one for Edgar Allan Poe again. I read the book and then watched the documentary \u201cEdgar Allan Poe \u2013 Amerikas abgr\u00fcndiger Pop-Poet.\u201d (If the video is no longer available because our Stone Age public broadcasters have deleted it, I recommend searching the title on YouTube\u2014sometimes other users reupload it and it\u2019s still accessible.)<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n I found it very interesting to learn more about Poe\u2019s life. He was born in Boston in 1809 and lived only to the age of forty. His mother died very young at twenty-three of tuberculosis, and the orphaned Edgar, not yet three, went to live with a foster family. They cared for him well and enabled him to study, but he began gambling and drinking. After a falling-out with his foster father, he left home and enlisted in the military. The strict discipline didn\u2019t suit him either, and after a few years he moved to Baltimore, where he lived with his aunt and cousin. At twenty-seven he married his thirteen-year-old cousin\u2014which would have been scandalous even then, which is why her age was adjusted upward. A love letter Poe wrote to her shows he was a complex personality and certainly not a balanced man. Professionally he was quite successful over the course of his life, but his alcoholism repeatedly threw his life off course. When his wife, like his mother, died young of tuberculosis, he processed his grief in poems. Only two years later he died under mysterious circumstances. Acquaintances found him, drunk or ill, outside a tavern and brought him to a hospital, where he died a few days later.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Although some of his publications gained recognition during his lifetime, his fame truly took off only after his death, and in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries he inspired numerous writers. According to the Arte documentary, he\u2019s now a pop star in America, complete with merchandising and various adaptations\u2014though I think that\u2019s a bit exaggerated. He did lead a dramatic life, and together with his work, the daguerreotype portrait, and his timeless, extraordinary texts, it\u2019s entirely understandable that he still enjoys a certain cult status.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n My edition is from Nikol Verlag and comes with a cloth binding, gold embossing, and pretty endpapers. For a small price you get a truly beautiful book that also makes a fine gift. In general, I really like books from Nikol Verlag. For those who prefer to read the stories in the original, I recommend the lovely Penguin Classics<\/em> edition, a small clothbound volume that\u2019s also quite handsome.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Conclusion:<\/strong> Poe\u2019s tales of the macabre are definitely recommended. His stories are profound, rich in symbolism, atmospherically dense, elegantly written, and always boast an additional layer of meaning that lingers with the reader long after finishing. I wasn\u2019t exactly terrified, but I devoured the stories\u2014they\u2019re simply gripping, with a consistently pleasant pace and a well-shaped arc of suspense. Edgar Allan Poe was also a very interesting figure, and the Arte documentary greatly enriches the reading experience. I\u2019ll definitely be getting the beautiful Coppenrath edition as well; while it includes some of the same tales as the Nikol volume, there are several others too\u2014all in a splendid gift edition. You really can\u2019t go wrong with Poe\u2014this is top quality once again. I can only recommend this short-story collection.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n Book information:<\/strong> The Masque of the Red Death and Other Tales of Horror<\/em> \u2022 Edgar Allan Poe \u2022 Nikol Verlag \u2022 192 pages \u2022 ISBN 9783868206296<\/p>\r\n\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Anyone who regularly browses the classics section inevitably comes across books by Edgar Allan Poe. His stories were also personally recommended to me again, so I decided to pick up one of the pretty editions from Nikol Verlag featuring his tales of the macabre. Seemingly a safe bet\u2014when a writer is still read 175 years … <\/p>\n<\/a><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<\/a><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n