Edgar Allan Poe, poet and author, died in 1849.

Edgar Allan Poe is known for his Gothic fiction, literary criticisms, supernaturalist poems and psychological thrillers, and he is credited by some with the invention of the "detective story" genre. Born Edgar Poe in 1809, he was the second son of actor David Poe, Jr. and actress Eliza Poe. Edgar’s father left the family shortly after his birth, and when his mother died two years later, he was taken into the home of John and Fanny Allan. He attended school in England and at the University of Virginia, served in the army and took an appointment, albeit brief, to West Point. Edgar and his foster-father quarreled regularly, and Poe eventually went to live with his aunt, Maria Clemm, and his cousin Virginia, whom he later married. He earned a living working as an editor for several different magazines, and it was during this time that he published the majority of works for which he is best known today, including The Fall of the House of Usher, The Murders in the Rue Morgue and The Raven. Plagued by his own alcoholism throughout his adult life, Poe died in Baltimore in 1849, at age 40. The precise circumstances of his death remain a mystery.

EDSITEment
Edgar Allen Poe, Ambrose Bierce, and the Unreliable Narrator (6–8) challenges students to consider a variety of narrative stances in Edgar Allen Poe's short story "The Tell-Tale Heart," and Ambrose Bierce's "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge."

For high school students, Edgar Allen Poe, Ambrose Bierce, and the Unreliable Biographer (9–12) helps students become literary sleuths as they attempt to separate biographical reality from myth. They also become careful critics, taking a stand on whether extra-literary materials such as biographies and letters should influence the way readers understand a writer's texts.

ReadWriteThink
Students explore reading strategies using the think-aloud process as they investigate connections between the life and writings of Edgar Allan Poe in Modeling Reading and Analysis Processes with the Works of Edgar Allan Poe (6–8), which begins with an in-depth exploration of The Raven.

In A Directed Listening–Thinking Activity for The Tell-Tale Heart (6–8), students participate in a Directed Listening-Thinking Activity (DLTA), in which they listen to the story The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe.

In Onomatopoeia: A Figurative Language Mini-lesson (9–12), students are introduced to the literary device of onomatopoeia, brainstorm a list of onomatopoeic words and then find examples of the technique in Edgar Allan Poe's poem "The Bells."