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Stuff You Missed in History Class

The Death of Poe

Stuff You Missed in History Class

iHeartPodcasts

Society & Culture, History

4.224.1K Ratings

🗓️ 13 June 2012

⏱️ 32 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In 1849, Edgar Allan Poe disappeared for five days before he was found semi-conscious outside of a saloon. He died four days later, presumably from alcohol abuse. Over the years, many alternate cause-of-death theories have emerged. Which is most likely?

Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from HouseOfWorks.com

0:12.0

Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Dubuena Trucker-Bordy and I'm Theradowee.

0:16.0

And we usually save our Spookier subjects for the fall in Halloween, of course,

0:21.0

but Summer is also a great time to curl up with a good mystery.

0:25.0

And today's subject, Edgar Allan Poe, definitely offers that.

0:29.0

A famous 19th century writer, poet, critic, and editor known for dabbling in moody and macabre topics.

0:36.0

Poe almost really needs no introduction, but of course we're going to give you one anyway.

0:41.0

We can't just skip this whole part.

0:44.0

No, that's what we do. So chances are you've at least heard of Poe.

0:47.0

And if you've taken any sort of post grade school level literature class,

0:51.0

you've probably read his work too, or at least the eerie, the raven, which is his most famous piece.

0:57.0

Or even grade school. I think I memorized the raven sometime in elementary school.

1:02.0

Well, you're very advanced there.

1:04.0

Oh, I don't know about that. I did it dramatically. That's why I chose it.

1:09.0

But Poe is also often credited with creating the first modern detective story with his murders of the room warg.

1:17.0

And ironically, some of the aspects of his own life, particularly the end of his life,

1:22.0

are really worthy of the type of fiction he wrote.

1:26.0

Yeah, basically in the fall of 1849, Poe disappeared for a few days.

1:31.0

And when he reappeared, he was in really bad shape. He was delirious.

1:35.0

And he appeared to a lot of people to be severely intoxicated.

1:39.0

And he died just a few days later.

1:41.0

Because of that, initially many people assumed alcoholism is what ultimately killed Poe.

...

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