The Raven

17 Quotes On Death And Life From Edgar Allan Poe, America's First Master Of Horror

Daniel Hayes
October 3, 2016
“In our endeavors to recall to memory something long forgotten, we often find ourselves upon the very verge of remembrance, without being able, in the end, to remember.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Ligeia
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Literature, Poems
“Men have called me mad; but the question is not yet settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence– whether much that is glorious– whether all that is profound– does not spring from disease of thought– from moods of mind exalted at the expense of the general intellect.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales and Poems
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, Scary Literature, short stories, Poems, Horror
“Coincidences, in general, are great stumbling blocks in the way of that class of thinkers who have been educated to know nothing of the theory of probabilities- that theory to which the most glorious objects of human research are indebted for the most glorious of illustration.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Murders in the Rue Morgue
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems, Horror
“They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Eleonora
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Poems, Scary Stories
“No pictorial or sculptural combinations of points of human loveliness, do more than approach the living and breathing human beauty as it gladdens our daily path.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Landscape Garden
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems
“There are moments when, even to the sober eye of Reason, the world of our sad Humanity may assume the semblance of a Hell -- but the imagination of man is no Carathis, to explore with impunity its every cavern. Alas! the grim legion of sepulchral terrors cannot be regarded as altogether fanciful -- but, like the Demons in whose company Afrasiab made his voyage down the Oxus, they must sleep, or they will devour us -- they must be suffered to slumber, or we perish.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Premature Burial
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, Scary Stories, short stories, Poems, Horror
“I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Poems, Scary Stories, Horror
“There are two bodies — the rudimental and the complete ; corresponding with the two conditions of the worm and the butterfly. What we call "death," is but the painful metamorphosis. Our present incarnation is progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full design.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Mesmeric Revelation
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems
“years of love have been forgot

In the hatred of a minute”
— Edgar Allan Poe, To - -
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, Scary Stories, short stories, Poems
“Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?”
— Edgar Allan Poe, A Dream Within a Dream
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, Poetry, Scary Stories, short stories
“Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems, Horror
“And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore!”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems, Horror
“From childhood’s hour I have not been
As others were—I have not seen
As others saw—I could not bring
My passions from a common spring—
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow—I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone—
And all I lov’d—I lov’d alone—”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Alone
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems
“I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active --not more happy --nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe Letter: July 2, 1844
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems, Letters, Progress
“When it most closely allies itself to Beauty: the death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world — and equally is it beyond doubt that the lips best suited for such topic are those of a bereaved lover.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Philosophy of Composition
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems, Writing, Composition
“There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be touched without emotion. Even with the utterly lost, to whom life and death are equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can be made.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque Of The Red Death
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems
“I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language to my wife. At length, I even offered her personal violence.”
— Edgar Allan Poe, The Black Cat
Tagged: Edgar Allan Poe, short stories, Scary Stories, Poems