The danger is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last—
And the fever called “Living”
Is conquered at last.
~ Edgar Allan Poe
"I became insane,
with long intervals of horrible sanity.” ~
Edgar Allan Poe
While reading the historical fiction novel, Mrs. Poe, a book that reimagines the real-life affair between Poe and Poet Frances Osgood, I became curious about Poe’s death in 1849. Turns out, Edgar Allan Poe couldn’t have written a better story about a mysterious death, than the reality of his own. Shortly before he died, he disappeared for six days, was found lurking outside a tavern wearing somebody else’s ratty clothes, deliriously called out for a man he supposably didn’t know called Reynolds, before he finally succumbed to an unknown illness days later in a hospital. Was he stricken with Rabies? Or struck down from the effects of alcoholism? Oddly, the leading theory indicates he was a victim of Cooping, a voting scam perpetrated by rascals that kidnapped men, often dressing them in numerous costumes, before forcing them to vote for their preferred candidate over and over. Poe was found outside a tavern on an election night, after all. The world will never know the truth, but the grisly writer must be thrilled to have his demise surrounded by intrigue to this day.
As a writer, I can relate to the tortured personality of Edgar Allan Poe. I have always felt life’s barbs keenly and told my husband to put death by a thousand cuts upon my tombstone. But was he really that tortured? Or was it defamation? I learned from the book that after Poe’s death, his foe Rufus W. Griswold, besmirched Poe, and forever altered histories imagining of Poe’s personality. But certainly, after reading the opening poem, he really did feel a certain amount of despondence about the roller coaster of publishing and life.
When I die, I want a granite bench for a gravestone with a stack of carved, stone books and perhaps, a seashell sitting on top. And maybe, I’ll have an epitaph that urges visitors to bring a cocktail and sit down to read one of my books to me as I lie beneath—forever listening.
"You've got to make your life count, now!" William Shatner
“Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.” ~ Edgar Allan Poe
