"Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow—
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream:
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream."
Edgar Allan Poe
"A Dream Within A Dream" (1849)
He is best remembered as the author of mysterious and macabre stories.
I remember becoming interested in his works when, as a teenager, I heard a recording by The Alan Parsons Project playing in a record store.
The album consisted entirely of songs that were inspired by his writings. It was called "Tales of Mystery and Imagination."
It fascinated me. It was the store's featured new release and, as such, was being played repeatedly for all the patrons to hear. At the front of the store, the album's cover was displayed beneath a sign that said, "Now playing."
I don't know how many people were persuaded to purchase that album by that kind of exposure and sales technique, but it worked on me. I bought it that day, having read nothing about it beforehand and having heard only a couple of songs while browsing in the store.
I marveled then, as I do now, at the mind that could compose poems and stories capable of inspiring such musical composition.
Even today, more than 30 years later, I am dazzled by the musicianship of the early incarnation of the group that was put together by a mostly unheralded engineer who worked on the Beatles' "Abbey Road" and Pink Floyd's "The Dark Side of the Moon."
Edgar Allan Poe's death, which remains shrouded in mystery nearly 160 years later, also fascinated me — and still does.
On Oct. 3, 1849, Edgar Allan Poe was found wandering the streets of Baltimore. Poe was delirious, according to the man who found him. He was "in great distress, and ... in need of immediate assistance."He was taken to a hospital, where he died four days later, never having been lucid long enough to explain what had happened — or why he was wearing clothes that did not belong to him when he was found.
All of Poe's medical records have been lost. Newspaper accounts of the day reported his death but used code words to imply that alcoholism was the cause of death.
Alcohol may or may not have caused Poe's death. Clearly, he struggled with alcohol during his life, but various reports over the years have indicated that it may not have caused his death at the age of 40. He may have been a victim of heart disease, cholera, epilepsy or rabies.
Like the death of Mozart at 35, of which I wrote the other day, Poe's death probably will remain unsolved.
But, as it was with Salieri in the death of Mozart, there does appear to be a plausible suspect in Poe's death.
A fellow named Rufus Griswold, who was a contemporary editor and critic, apparently was one of Poe's adversaries who also apparently tried to smear Poe after his death.
The effort was temporarily successful — until the sources for Griswold's assertions were discredited and the allegations were exposed as lies or distortions.
Poe's reputation was restored — but the cause of his death remains undetermined.
