Author Description

In this overview of Poe's career and major writings, Scott Peeples does not make a case for a single way of reading Poe but instead emphasizes the great variety of meanings one can derive from his work - and the great variety within the work itself. At the same time, he articulates certain tendencies as keys to understanding Poe, among them the artist's quest for control - over his audience, his art, and his own career; the "double" as a model for human consciousness; and speculation on the nature and finality of death. Although these and other themes surface throughout Poe's career, Peeples stresses thematic and stylistic changes, making a general claim that Poe's writing went through recognizable phases.