Edgar Allan Poe's background

Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston on January 19, 1809. His parents were traveling  actors. Unfortunately both his parents passed away before he was even 3 years old. John and Frances Allan adopted Poe. John was a wealthy tobacco exporter . He sent Poe to the best boarding school money could buy. Poe also attend the university of Virginia where he excelled. John did not send Poe to college with enough money to attend the college. Poe started gambling to try to come up with the rest of the money to attend the college.Poe returned back to Richmond but that didn't last too long. He found out that his “fiancee” was engaged to another man. Poe only lasted a few months in the Allen's mansion till he stormed out and began his journey to become a writer. He enlisted in the military and attend west point. That only lasted eight months. After he got thrown out of West Point Poe went back to Baltimore to call upon his relatives for help his aunt took him in to her home. During Poe's time in Baltimore John Allen died Allen left Poe completely out of his will so now Paul was living in poverty and trying to live off his stories and poems. Poe bought his aunt and cousin back to Richmond with him. He married his cousin Virginia who was only 13 years old at the time. Paul looking for money moved to New York City and Philadelphia. He wrote for many different magazines trying to make a name for himself. In 1845 Poe published “The raven” this finally made Poe a household name and famous enough to draw a crowd. He begun to get paid more for his work. He  moved to the countryside with Virginia who was ill with tuberculosis. In 1847 she passed away at the young age of 27. This left Poe devastated he started traveling from city to city. On his way to Philadelphia he stopped in Baltimore he was found semi-conscious lying on the ground. He was brought to a local hospital . He passed away 4 days after being found. He never regained enough consciousness to tell anyone what happened. There is a lot of speculation about his death something I will dive deeper into later in the blog

work cited

Work cited
Biography. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://poets.org/poet/edgar-allan-poe.Geiling, N. (2014, October 7). The (Still) Mysterious Death of Edgar Allan Poe. Retrieved from
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/still-mysterious-death-edgar-allan-poe-180952936/.Giordano, R. (n.d.). The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe. Retrieved from https://poestories.com/read/raven.Giordano, R. (n.d.). The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe. Retrieved from https://poestories.com/read/blackcat.How was Poe's writing affected by his life? - zoesmall. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://sites.google.com/a/scasd.org/zoesmall/poe-essay.Poe's Biography: Edgar Allan Poe Museum. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.poemuseum.org/poes-biography.The Cask of Amontillado. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.poemuseum.org/the-cask-of-amontillado.The Masque of the Red Death. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://.poemuseum.org/the-masque-of-the-red-death.

Class reflection

  For me englsih is one of my least favorite subjects. I dislike reading and writing essays, and these  are the main thing you do in english. But to my suprise english 102 was not as bad as i thought i general enjoyed most of the stories and felt like its was a way better formatted class then english 101. I also liked how deep we went into the stories to find things I would've never found by myself. I also liked how you learned about the writers and their background that helps me to understand their work better than I would've before. Overall I was surprised on how much I enjoyed the class compared to my other english classes I took over the years. I would have to say this was the best engkishg class I took over my years of schooling.

Bio of me

 Before you start to read my blog let's get to know a little bit about who is writing it. My name is Raul muniz but my friends call me RJ it stands for Raul JR. I am 19 years old and my birthday is on july 7th 2000,  and i go to farmingdale state college. My home town is deer park and i spent my whole life living there till this day. I am a die hard giants fan. I watch every game no matter how bad we are and try to go to a couple  games a year at metlife. My hobbies are sports, video games, music and shoes. I'm going to touch more on the shoes sidr of me in the next blog post. Now that you know about me have fun reading my blog.

Reselling shoes

        For many people, shoes are just something you wear. You buy them use them everyday tear them up and get new ones. But for other people it's a culture, a hobby and a way to make friends and money. Sneaker reselling might be a new topic for many. So i will try to explain it the best a can. Think of supply and demand there is a new jordan that comes out and sold at the store for $200 but let's say there are only 1000 pairs made but 5000 people want a pair. So once they sell out in store and online witch could take seconds there is no way to get them for $200 anymore so people resell the shoes for more money let's say they sell it for $500 thats a $300 profit for doing nothing. I used to do this a lot during highschool to make extra money. I have since slowed down on it because now it's getting harder to get hyped shoes. Many places like nike have made a raffle system now so it's all luck on getting the shoe. But it's not just about reselling and making money the shoes are a way to express yourself and people like to collect them and build a collection of shoes over the years. Just like how some people collect expensive watches and purses it's the same thing with shoes. And i am one of the people who collect shoes.

The Cask of Amontillado

 “The Cask of Amontillado “also shows heavily theme of alcoholism.Fortunato takes the opportunity to get drunk and that comes back to hurt him in a big way. Montresor is basically able to lead fortunato to his own death because he was drunk and did not know what was going on. This relates to Poe because his death could easily be blamed on him being drunk and getting lead to his death. Since there are many  way on how his death happens you cant just blame it on alcohol but you can make a good case that it was. 

Link to  “The Cask of Amontillado “ - https://www.poemuseum.org/the-cask-of-amontillado

Poe's death

Poe's death is very weird and mysterious. its was October 3, 1849 when Joseph W. Walker found a man semi-conscious lying on the ground that man was Poe. Joseph got Poe medical health  but 4 days later he passed. There are many ways this could of happened but let's start first on how he got where he was. A week earlier he was on his way to philadelphia to edit a collection of poems. He never made it to philadelphia. For some unknown reason Poe was at baltimore his home town and that is where he passed away. There are many reasons that might of caused him to pass. beating ,,Alcoholrabies,braintummor ,flu or murder. Each of them have some good support to back them up but none are 100% true and there's no way to prove what the real one is. I believe that the causes of his death was alcohol it is noted that Poe could not handle alcohol he would be drunk from a cup of wine. Poe once fell deathly ill before but was able to heal up. One may think it's because he stopped drinking and him drinking was the cause of his illness .”another such attack would prove fatal." this is a quote from his physician. I believe that he made some “friends” on his way there baltimore and they got his friendship and trust from alcohol. They made him drink and that proved to be fatal for him. This is a very sad death because he tried to turn his life around and stop drinking but in the end that is what killed him.
Read more about his death -  https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/still-mysterious-death-edgar-allan-poe-180952936/

The Black Cat

“The Black Cat” is another story that is infunerice by Poe's background. This story focuses on heavy alcoholism it's also very dark. The story starts with the narrator in jail talking about his love of animals and how he isn't crazy despite what he did. The narrator has random breakouts of anguer and pysciy hurts his wife and also his other pets but never touches the cat(Pluto).his breakouts are caused by his alcoholism. One night he comes home drunk and tries to play with Pluto but Pluto runs away and doesn't want to play. He then grabs pluto and pluto bites him. In a fit of anger he grabs pluto and cuts out his eye with a penknife. The next morning he wakes up and knows he cant reverse what he did. He ends up hanging pluto from a tree. Later that night the narrator house burned down. He tries to act like the events are not a product of each other but later that day the neighbours are gaiters around a wall with an imprint of a cat with a rope around his head. He can't escape what he has done and it begins to drive him crazy. A couple months later he is coming home drunk and finds a stray black cat with a missing eye, almost a clone of pluto only difference is he has a white spot on his chest. He brings the cat home to please his wife. After having the cat in his home he starts to build a hate for him he believes it is pluto trying to get revenge on him. One day him and his wife go into the cellar with the cat. The narrator almost trips over the cat and finally snaps he grabs an axe and tries to attack a cat. His wife tries to denfind the cat and in a pit of rage he burinnes the axe in her head killing her. He ends up hiding her body in basement walls. A couple days later the police show up. The narrator applies with them and leads them threw the house very calm and collective he believes he is going to get away with it. Once he lead them into the basement he taps onto the wall where the body is to show the solid craftsmanship of the house. Once he does that there is a cry inside the wall the police tore down the wall and found  the body and on top of it is the cat. This story is a straight product of Poe's life the main theme is alcoholism something that Poe's life was affected with. Another theme I took form this story is trying to hide from your past. The narrator knows he messed up by what he did. He tries to make up for it by bringing home the stray cat. This drives him crazy and he thinks it the spirit of pluto trying to get revenge. In all reality, it was just a normal cat but in his head he made it seem like that. It drove him crazy and ended up killing his wife and going to jail.

Link to “The Black Cat” - https://poestories.com/read/blackcat

The Masque of the Red Death

“The Masque of the Red Death” is a short story written by Poe. The story is about a plague called the red death that gruesomely kills it victims. It spreads across this fictional country very fast. The main character in the story is the prince, Prospero.Once the plague starts he grabbed 1000 of his friends and locks everyone in the palace to keep them in and everyone else out. A couple of months later he throws a party once midnight hits an uninvited masked man appeared at the party. Wearing a mask that symbolizes the red death. The prince run after death with a dagger after cashing him for 7 rooms he finally catches up to him in a black room with red windows Prospero try to stab death with the dagger but prospero dies. Finally the rest of the party caught up to see prospero dead and to find out that no one was under the mask, then the whole palace dies from the red death. The person with the mask was death himself.  Poe wrote this story after the passing of his wife. He was very depressed at that time and this story shows that. Also the red death symbolize what killed his mom and wife tuberculosis. The symptoms are the same dizziness, sharp pain and seeping blood ext… so the plague itself was influenced by the real life illness tuberculosis that affected his and his loved ones life. The main theme I took from this story was that fact that no matter what you can't escape death. “Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.” No matter what you do to try to avoid death it will catch up to you and take you and your loved ones it's just part of life.

Link to the Masque of the Red Death https://www.poemuseum.org/the-masque-of-the-red-death

“Annabel Lee”

  Poe's stories are very dark and deal with death and loss. Many of the lost are young women which is  a call from his own life. He lost 3 of the most beloved women in his life. Mom , step mom and wife. These moments in his past shows up in his stotys. One of the stories is the  poem “Annabel Lee” he talks about his love for his wife who was also his underage cousin . “I was a child and she was a child, / In this kingdom by the sea,/But we loved with a love that was more than love” (7-9) in this quote he says “I was a child and she was a child,” watch is pryley true she was 13 so she was a child but he was 26. 26 was and never will be considered a child. He also says there love was more than just love they had a special connection that he never had with anyone else and she was the love of his life. He also writes “all the night-tide, I lie down by the side/Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,/  In her sepulchre there by the sea—/in her tomb by the sounding sea.”(40-42) Poe is saying that nothing can stop his love for her not even death. He goes every night and lays next to her tomb so he can be with her every night. This poem relates right to the death of his wife and is influenced by it.

Link to “Annabel Lee” -https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44885/annabel-lee

 

How Poe's life showed form his work

Poe’s work is very Distinctive his stories are very dark and depression with a mix of some supernatural elements to them. As we know Poe had a hard upbringing with his parents both passing before he was even 3 years old. He also lost he wife to the same thing he lost his mother to tuberculosis. His background 100% shows up in his work like many other writers. He writes about death and the other side in many of his stories. He also commonly used the theme of young women dying in his sytoys. That was a product of seeing his mom, step mom and wife all died during his lifetime. Another commonly used theme in his stories is alcohol, during the last years of his life after his wife passed he became very depressed and started drinking a lot and doing other drugs to self heal his depression. This also shows up in his stories  with numerous alcoholic characters and stories like “The Cask of Amontillado”. I'm going to go deeper into both themes later in the blog.