I am doing a research paper on why he was obsessed with death i have most of the answers but if u have some answers please tell me! also how did his stepmom die? thanks

-- Anonymous, March 16, 2001

Answers

Imaginary,

The view that Poe was obsessed with death is certainly understandable but, nonetheless, a presumptive one. It is my personal view that Poe was singularly possessed of gaining his own literary independence. The evidence for this is much more substantial. Death was simply an element of life that he knew and understood very well. It also satisfied the morbid curiosity of the public and provided him subsistence, however small it may have been.

Technically, Poe never had a step-mother. Frances Keeling Valentine Allan was his foster mother. Frances died on February 28, 1829 in Richmond, Virginia following a "lingering and painful" illness. There is no evidence it was tuberculosis although this was not uncommon at the time. She was buried in the Shockoe Hill Cemetery on March 2. Poe attempted to get back to Richmond from the Army for the funeral but arrived on leave a day late.

John Allan remarried over a year later to Louisa Patterson and had three sons.

Regards,

-- Anonymous, March 16, 2001