the complete tales and poems of edgar allan poe 1938

Keywords: pseudoscience, Edgar Allan Poe, nineteenth-century, literature, medicine This is reflected in some of Poe’s stories: dyspnea, anxiety, paroxysm, coma, suspended animation, use of prosthetics, bio-augmentation, bio-modification and epilepsia in “Loss of Breath ” monomania, catatonia, catalepsia, narcolepsia and inbreed in “Eleanora” and “The Fall of the House of Usher ” cataplexy in “Berenice ” miasmatic theories, Spanish influenza, and yellow fever in “The Masque of the Read Death ” hallucinogens, hypnotics, sedatives and ancient anesthesia in “The Man that was Used Up,” proboscis and cyclopia in “Bon-Bon ” analgesia in “The Business Man ” and tuberculosis in “Ligeia.” This article will delve deeper in the medical aspect of these scientific narrations in Edgar Allan Poe’s work.

The growing popularity of scientific sensationalism by physics in the American prewar period, professional medical publications, treaties such as Klecksographien by Justinus Kerner (which was source of inspiration, also, to the well-known Hermann Rorschach), magazines, English periodicals of the 1830s and theatre, influenced Poe and his creations significantly. On the other hand, America was under the influence of sensationalism: pseudoscience and the pseudoscientific theories, which were in the borders of hoax and truth.

America was witnessing the rise of a scientific era where most of the scientific theories as known today were being developed. One can also observe in Poe’s texts an attempt to satirize, criticize and leave record of his ambitious interest in the nineteenth-century medicine and medical practices. Edgar Allan Poe’s knowledge gathered from mesmerists and pseudoscientists of his time finds a reflection in his short stories in the form of organic decomposition and electrical theories.

The complete tales and poems of edgar allan poe 1938