I have read these off and on since I was a teen, and I never thought of him as a creator, yet I cannot think of who could have brazed the trail before him. Amazing insight by you, Frederick.:)

Hey, Jo --

You posted this, according to Goodreads.com, "zero minutes ago!"
Thanks for your comment.

Take care,

Fred

When I think of famous writers of short stories, they all have written famous novels, except Poe. Hemingway's stories are landmarks, but he also wrote A FAREWELL TO ARMS. Joyce wrote DUBLINERS, but he also wrote ULYSSES (and DUBLINERS has a uniting theme.)
But Poe is known for his stories and "The Raven." I think THE GOLD-BUG was a novel, but it's not what he's remembered for. O. Henry wrote only stories, but nothing he wrote is seared into our brains the way "The Tell-Tale Heart" is.

Have u read anything by Saki? Saki (H.H Munro), he has written many short stories, I have several titles on e-book, but I don't know which one is good...

~e

Saki is new to me. Are the stories good. When we define short stories, I am thinking adult intended, short on words but moving and entertaining. Maybe not historic, cultural, children's as these are another area to me. I like to think of a writer, who using less pages/words can take you though an experience...

Poe thought that writing was only good if it could be experienced all in one sitting; at least, that's what he claimed. When writers have that sort of oddly specific preference, I tend to imagine they may be trying to downplay a shortcoming. The greatest benefit of this theory is that it indicates that Gertrude Stein was a talentless whiner.

I tend to prefer Poe's detective fiction over his horror stuff, if only because the latter is so repetitiously affected. It is a common misconception that he was the earliest writer of detective fiction, one I wouldn't bring up around my paramour; unless you want her to dig out her master's thesis and make you feel terribly uninformed.

Oh we all know a few with those thesis armed conversations on the tip of there tongue.
The only gratification is watching them follow basic traffic directions. I am evil. :)

Well, she did fine when she drove us around to various museums in an unfamiliar city. No gratification there, it seems. I'll have to keep looking.

In all earnestness, it's difficult enough to find someone with a professional and well-supported critical view of the 'jingle man' (or literature in general), even on this site. That I found one who was also a single young lady seems the more lucky.

I suppose it is a cliche for a man to be hen-pecked and constantly corrected, but it's not as hard to swollow when she provides a well-versed bibliography along with it.

Even as I wrote my review I realized there probably were authors previous to Poe who'd tackled the detective story. But, given that inventors generally have predecessors, I consider Poe the inventor who got it right.
(I'm reading the Oxford Universiy Press edition of SWEENEY TODD. Our Mr. Depp is on the cover, but the text is from the 1820s. It is entertaining and scary. Obviously, Poe had competition. But, sifting through the rubble, Poe comes up again. SWEENEY TODD is a serialized work. Poe's one-offs are powerful and memorable.

Well as always Frederick and also to you Keely and Emanuel, I have loved this. Great discussion!
Meaningful thoughts.;)

I quite agree, Frederick: often those who are the inspirators of a genre or movement cannot be technically classified or defined by that movement. One example would be Tolkien, who now has innumerable followers in his wake, but who is not really a fantasy writer.

I've often found that there is a pattern of decreasing return in inspiration, and I might timidly suggest that this is the main reason that an innovator cannot be judged or defined by those who tread their wake.

In the example of Tolkien, this pattern might be seen by looking at Tolkien's reasons for writing: firstly there was his study of language, and secondly, there were the mythological tales he worked with.

After reading the Eddas, Beowulf, and the Nibelungleid, one begins to form a deeper understanding of what Tolkien was attempting. Indeed, separating the work from its scholarship denies it both meaning and intent; one may as well try to understand Paradise Lost without The Bible and The Aeneid.

Of course, that's just what most of Tolkien's followers do (who has time to read Welsh folktales these days?). I'd suggest that Poe may be named as a similar titular father, but that the tropes of the genre were laid out by Wilkie Collins. Luckily for Wilkie, Poe had none such esoteric aspirations as Tolkien, so there is somewhat less study and linguistic knowledge required to bear that torch.

Indeed, Poe seems ever willing to sacrifice nearly everything for the sound of words. I suppose it is the small sense of realism and the logical progression of these stories which I feel pulls them out of Poe's usual affectation. Perhaps the writer, like a fox, fights harder when constrained.

Hey, Emanuel (and Jo and Keely),

Saki was the pseudonym of an English aristocrat (H. H. Munro) who wrote vignettes of a sharp, sarcastic sort. He was killed in World War One.
"Shredni Vashtar" (which I may be mis-spelling) is probably his most famous one.
His attitudes are very outdated, but allowing for the changes of the last hundred years, he can be understood as, essentially, a light humorist. If his writing is genuinely cruel, I think he was unaware of this.

Well, Poe achieves in obtaining the "single effect," which he thought was the entire point of short story writing. I'm not sure I agree with his philosophy of short story writing, however, and so I have actually found his tales somewhat lacking. His poetry, which is often dismissed by critics, however, is impressive to me.

Gosh, I love goodreads! Thank you Frederick for the research. I veer away from genuinely dark and sarcastic stuff, so no wonder I missed him.
Some would say Poe is dark. I think it is different with him. A genius who was ill in ways.
Yes Skylar, I do understand that. I can honestly say I have read and reread his poems more then this stories, but am glad I read both.

Well, there's a reason a lot of critics downplay him. Poe's poetic contemporaries, especially Emerson and Whitman, tended to dismiss Poe; calling him 'The Jingle Man' because his poems were so sing-song.

Historically, Poetry has been considered the single most complex and difficult form in literature. Poetry was known for the depth of meaning and allusion which could be put in only one line. Indeed, an analysis of one of Petrarch's Sestinas--thirty-nine lines--could be hundreds of pages long: the length of an entire book.

When one looks at the most highly referential works in english, they are invariably poetic works. Milton's Paradise Lost is often cited as the most densely allusive work in the language, though one could look to Shakespeare for a more simplistic example of referential poetry.

Poets were also known as the greatest wits of the land, and poetry was often the place where intellectual battles were fought. By hiding levels of meaning, Wyatt was able to openly criticize the very king of England. Milton's greatest work was a philosophical analysis of power and rebellion. Donne was well known for stretching the limits of rhetorical argument and metaphysical philosophy in his poetry.

The problem with Poe is that when one begins to read his poetry, there is simply not that level of depth or wit present. Keats was not much less obsessed with the importance of the sound of a single word, but he would also dither over the meaning of a single word for hours.

Poe's poems (and short stories) tend toward a narrow band of theme, and instead of exploring them, tend to expound upon them over and over. Likewise, while he does make mythological allusions, they usually do not combine to make any greater meaning.

So, for most poets and critics, reading Poe is like watching an action movie. It can be fun, but there is relatively little meaning or conceptual exploration going on. Of course, he still has more conceptual exploration than many modern writers.

I'd say the strength of his detective stories is that there is no need for exploration of philosophical concepts, so they serve his single-mindedness quite well.

I understand your point about his poetry. He is commonly regarded as a mere technician, and there is some truth to that. However, it takes a special kind of skill and talent to master "sound" to the level Poe has mastered it, and I think the very real difficulty of achieving such levels of technical mastery are often dismissed. It is true, however, that one does not generally find in Poe's poetry the level upon level of meanings. While one may not be inclined to read it 1000 times, he may not be so inclined to analyze it. Yet there is something to be said for a work that can inspire countless repeat, enjoyed readings. It may be of a different class or genre (as is the action movie verses the genre), but to create the consummate action movie in a sea of bad action movies is still an accomplishment worth noting.

Oh yes, I do appreciate Poe's familiarity and ear for language. I did rate this collection highly, after all. I just find it suits him better in prose than in poetry.

I am still analyzing all this, though I know what I love. Poe being rejected is easy to picture as I think he was definitely in touch with his own world. I think his way of reaching/communicating was at its best on paper, and I have a feeling people skills where never important to him. That disconnect is there, probable as a self-protection mechanism at some early point, and never worked around to changing.