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HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 12:53 am
by Magnolia
This is the month we celebrate Edgar Allan Poe and what better way to christen this forum than to talk about the mysterious circumstances involving the last days of Edgar Allan Poe on Earth?

He was a Boston-born boy who was raised by a foster father who later disowned him. He was an alcoholic & sometimes quite arrogant but one thing was for certain regardless of his good & bad traits... he was a genius. He lost his wife Virginia in January of 1847 which became a catalyst for a downward spiral often seen in eccentric genius's; especially alcoholic genius's.

His lapse into gross amounts of alcohol led to dementia & blackouts. He admitted to drinking "God, only knows how often or how much". He was in a fragile mental & emotional state as he forged ahead with life in the home of his mother-in-law in Fordham, NY. He had bouts with what were described as "collapses" and there was speculation that he had attempted suicide with laudanum (and laudanum was a drug of choice for suicides in that day). He was quoted as saying the reason for his drunken state was "about Virginia".

He made a temporary recovery in 1849 when he went for lectures in Richmond, VA. It is the most mysterious period of time in Poe's life what transpired between September 29th - October 3rd. Whatever happened during those five days is unknown except that he was found on October 3rd dressed in someone else's clothes in a bar in a state of dementia. He was taken to the hospital where he died four days later. He never recovered mentally and was not able to tell what happened in the last days of his life.

What happened? Alcoholism gone fatal? Self-poisoning? Murder by poison? What happened in those last five days of life?

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 2:51 am
by Bella
A very interesting subject, indeed!
In my 8th grade lit class, after reading "The Raven" and "A Tell Tale Heart" we found out that he married his cousin, which is strange enough in and of itself.
A deeply disturbed man for sure, though his literary works have withstood the test of time.
It very well could have been the alcohol.
He was also rumored to have taken morphine, but as I wasn't there at the time...who knows?
It was during the time that things like arsenic were being recommended as healthful ingestants and even put into beauty products.
http://www.botgard.ucla.edu/html/botany ... y/Papaver/

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 3:25 am
by Samsara
Ooooh reminds me of this post:
FeyLady wrote:Makes me think of the legends of the Leanan Sidhe:

Paraphrasing Wiki:
In Celtic folklore, the Irish leanan sídhe (Scottish Gaelic, liannan shìth , sometimes spelled Lianhan Sidhe or Leanhaun Shee) is a beautiful woman of the Aos Sí (or fairy folk) who takes a human lover. Lovers of the leanan sídhe are said to live brief, though highly inspired, lives.

The leanan sídhe is generally depicted as a beautiful muse, who offers inspiration to an artist in exchange for fame and glory; however, this exchange frequently results in madness for the artist, and often premature death.

The name comes from the Gaelic word "leannan", a sweetheart, concubine, or favourite. Also, Sídhe, "of the fairy mounds".
When I was in looney phase, I wrote the best works of literature. I figured my craziness was a result of adolescent hormones. But now that I look back I recall having a mental breakdown not because of brain growth spurts but the feeling of being haunted every night.

I may appear level headed now....but I recall a time where a professional might of sent me into a padded room with a lovely white jacket.

Creative writting is like automatic writing where your just channeling nonsense on to paper. When you are channeling....you open yourself to many spiritual sources, good and bad. I think Mr. Poe met Mr. or Mrs. Bad.

I was there so....I'm sure his death was a spiritual source.

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 12:13 pm
by Twilight Storm
suga wrote: When I was in looney phase, I wrote the best works of literature. I figured my craziness was a result of adolescent hormones. But now that I look back I recall having a mental breakdown not because of brain growth spurts but the feeling of being haunted every night.

I may appear level headed now....but I recall a time where a professional might of sent me into a padded room with a lovely white jacket.
Wow, I can't tell you how much I can relate to that! I couldn't have put it any better myself!!

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 4:53 pm
by Bella
That's a natural part of life for the majority of young girls around 12 -14 years old because of the hormonal changes that occur at that age.
I'm sure many more can relate through going through an "emo" period around that time.

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 7:36 pm
by Samsara
Is it normal to have sleep paralysis every other night, feeling as if someone's sitting on top of you and locking your jaw closed so you can't scream?

I was 16-17 when this happened.

I did end up burning and throwing out all my writings. Such a shame too, because it was some amazing ramblings.

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 8:19 pm
by Ashino Tsume roshi
The death of Edgar Allan Poe is a mystery, no doubt about it…
From the time of the death of Poe’s wife, Virginia Eliza Clemm Poe on January 30, 1847 at the age of 25, Edgar never recovered his “mental balance” but did contue to write truly amazing stuff. Some people have made up huge cases of Poe being “over the edge” for marrying the daughter of a family connection who was only 13 at the time. But given that Jerry Lee Lewis married a very young girl, that in the Wild West, Native American Women married White settlers at this age, and that even more amazing marriages took place in ancient Egypt, that whether you approve of youth marriages or not, it cannot be used as a reason for either a priori mental unbalance or later mental unbalance. Also, probably, Poe’s marriage was loving but non-sexual in nature.

Edgar Poe was the first American writer to make his living exclusively with published writing and editing. Also, he wasn’t a bad business man, but he was a spendthrift. Example when in 1845, he published The Raven, oddly enough it came out in 5 different magazines/journals all of which had some form of a contract and payment with Poe….I have the first of these 1st editions, which was The Evening Mirror, published January 29, 1845, although he had already set up 5 more publications that took place over the next 5-6 weeks. Within these different publications exist infintesmal minor differences.

Virginia Poe died on January 30, 1847 at the Poe cottage at Fordham in the Bronx, New York. Poe said “"My poor Virginia still lives, although failing fast and now suffering much pain”. She had been suffering for 5 long years. She died “of pulmonary consumption”.

Basically Poe was devastated. From wikipedia: “Poe regularly visited Virginia's grave. As his friend Charles Chauncey Burr wrote, "Many times, after the death of his beloved wife, was he found at the dead hour of a winter night, sitting beside her tomb almost frozen in the snow”.
Now then, back in November 2008, Magnolia did a spirit binding for me of Edgar Allan Poe, Eliza Poe (Poe’s mother), and Virgina Eliza Clemm Poe, and to quote Magnolia “They are a talkative bunch..” So, I thought, why not ask their spirits what happened? Why not? So I did.

Here is what I got. First of all Edgar Poe doesn’t remember parts of what happened.

Edgar: “ I was using alcohol as a mental pain killer and tincture of laudanum (basically liquid opium) as a physical pain killer….”

Virginia: “I was trying to ‘break through’ to him and try to make himsee me and be happy…”

Edgar: “I did have a vision of Virgina, but my body responded in odd ways that still, I don’t understand…I decided to visit my mother’s grave and decided to go to Saint John’s Church in Richmond Virgina and try to find her grave…and somehow this was fused into my delirium with Virginia Eliza…I was seeing them both in a flickering series of movements very much like the candle of lantern flame projecting its light through a glass picture slide of a magick lantern projected onto the walls of buildings as I moved along…I found a graveyard, and the delirium of my mind said I would soon be talking with both my dear mother and dear wife…It was raining…then there is a period of no remembrance.

Suddenly I was being carried to a house. I was stripped of my wet clothes, it may have been raining, I know not anything of this.

Eliza Poe: We could see Edgar, and I think he saw us. We were torn as we saw that Edgar was determined to reach us and we were very worried that this would lead to permanent ilness or death..Edgar was never a person to suicide himself..but he was temporarily demented and there was nothing that we could do…”

Edgar Poe: I woke up in a hospital situation and knew I was dying…and struggled with my desire to live conflicted by my desire to rejoin my mother and my wife, and the rest you know…”
So they will be never separated again…Nevermore………………………..
Caiyros

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 4:47 am
by MysticStar
When I look at the Pictures of him, its some thing in the head/brain area
It does not feel right to me.
Off topic, the Poe week, is it this week, like the Newsletter says, or next week from what the online store says? :daze:

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 1:03 pm
by Magnolia
This week is one of the Death of Legends week celebrating Dashiell Hammett, Humphrey Bogart, Emma Hamilton, and Wyatt Earp.

Re: HOW DID EDGAR ALLAN POE DIE?

Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2010 4:11 pm
by Bella
suga wrote:Is it normal to have sleep paralysis every other night, feeling as if someone's sitting on top of you and locking your jaw closed so you can't scream?

I was 16-17 when this happened.

I did end up burning and throwing out all my writings. Such a shame too, because it was some amazing ramblings.

OT: You may want to Google "Astral Catalepsy".
This is what happens during re-entry after Astral Travel because you are sort of half-in and half-out of your physical body. It is perfectly normal. I used to have such experiences nightly, although I remember being 3-5 at the time. It gets easier to control with practice.

VLF-LF-WAVES wrote: So, I thought, why not ask their spirits what happened? Why not? So I did.
I could have easily contacted him to ask, but I was honestly never much of a Poe fan.
I acknowledge the fact that he has created lasting works of literature, however dark and depressing they may be, but his energy is not pleasant to me...not someone I wanted to have contact with.