Each person may experience something that makes them feel dispirited for a short period of time, but individuals that suffer from depression endure long-term pain stemming from parts of their early life that impaired their mind. This illness affects the function of the brain, which alters an individual’s mood, the way they think, feel, and behave. It causes a change of daily life. Studies of depression have shown that it may come about due to traumatic past life experiences or stress brought to a person through tense periods of their life. From a scientific perspective, depression is also caused due to a failure of systems in your body. Depression is commonly seen in writers because of the stress they experience. The feelings and thoughts as …show more content…
As a young boy, Poe was left to be orphaned, and he felt no love from his adoptive parents. From the start of his life, he experienced the death of loved ones, including his mother, and he was repeatedly confronted with the same tragedy throughout his life. When he began to write, he faced rejection, from companies, and from himself, when he began to feel disappointed and a need to turn to alcohol. Because of his stress, his brain may have been affected by systems that faltered, as explained previously, which would have caused his behavior and thought processes to …show more content…
He had been engaged to Elmira Royster, but his adoptive father, John Allan, had come between their relationship. Edgar constantly argued with John and blamed him for all the problems he faced. Poe feared that he would be shut out from all of his family and John Allan cut off all ties with Edgar leaving him to feel no sense of love at all. Poe began his writing based on his experiences with his adoptive father John. Edgar felt resentment to John Allan which led him to even signing his name as only “Edgar A. Poe.” He published Tamerlane and Other Poems, where the search for personal contentment was found throughout, mirroring the trouble Poe faced from the start of his life. From that point on, Poe tried to succeed in his publications based on experiences in his life, but rejections continued to come his
Paragraph B: After his mother’s death, Edgar went to live with a foster family and his siblings went to other families. His foster father was John Allen, a Scottish tobacco merchant living in Richmond, Virginia. Edgar took on the Allen’s last name as his middle name and became known then as Edgar Allen Poe. The family traveled to England in 1815 where Edgar began his schooling. He attended schools in Irvine, Scotland, Chelsea ...
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) was born to traveling actors in Boston. He was hit hard with death at a young age as his mother and father both died within two days when Poe was only two years old. The wealthy John Allan and his wife became the legal guardians of young Edgar. When Edgar was fourteen, he met the first woman in his life, Jane Stith Stanard, the inspiration to his poem “To Helen”(1831). However, Mrs. Stanard passed away only a year after Poe first met her. In 1825 Poe became engaged with Elmira Royster. While he was away from her, he would write her many letters; however, Elmira’s parents intercepted the letters. Edgar wondered why she never replied, and when he went back to see her, he found out that she married someone else. This left Poe in a very depressed state. Poe’s relationship with the Allans was never secure, and this became evident when John Allan refused to pay Edgar’s debts at the University of Virginia. Edgar was then kicked out of school. In the next couple of years Poe has to fight through the death of his foster mother and his brother. Then in 1833 he moved in with his Aunt Maria Clemm. John Allan died a year later. He then married his cousin Virginia three years later. Virginia then died in 1842 (Anderson 9-64). Poe was introduced to death and betrayal throughout his young life leaving him in a very depressed state, and these traits are present throughout his short stories and poems.
Dementia is a disease that affects the brain’s function of thinking and behavior, and in some cases language and judgment. The disease was proven to interfere with the ability to control emotions and behavior, which explains Poe’s self-destructive mind that lead to his attempt of suicide preceding his wife, Virginia’s, death.(NINDS 1) Poe’s dementia was progressive, meaning that his condition worsened throughout his life. A combination of Poe’s drinking habits and a manic depression could have contributed to this. The slight differences in Poe’s writing demonstrate the progression of mental decline. For example, his writing progresses from his early writing’s appreciation of tragic mysteries of life to an almost pure obsession of death.(Merriman 1)
Depression is considered a mental disorder that can lead an individual to commit suicide, experiment fatal risk that can injure his or her life. Furthermore, an individual feeling depressed lacks motivation to do anything progressive with his or her life. With that said, these individuals sometime gives up interest in activities that were once enjoyable, gets in a phase were he or she loses appetite, begins to overeat, loses concentration on what he or she is trying to complete, and becomes indecisiveness. Moreover, depression is a condition that makes an individual feel miserable, have no motivation to any activity that can influence his or her views, actions, welfare. Furthermore, depressed individuals at times may feel sad, apprehensive, desperate, destitute, useless, awkward, short-tempered, and agitated. In addition, the melancholy of depression is categorized by a greater concentration and length that is attached to severe symptoms. According to Wedding & Corsini (2014) states, “Physical disease, severe and acute stress, and chronic stress area also precipitating factors” (Pp. 240) of an individu...
Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of actress Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe and actor David Poe, Jr. His father abandoned the family in 1810, and his mother died of tuberculosis when he was only two, so Poe was taken into the home of John Allan, a successful tobacco merchant in Richmond, Virginia. Although his middle name is often misspelled as "Allen," it is actually "Allan" after this family. After attending the Misses Duborg boarding school in London and Manor School in Stoke Newington, London, England, Poe moved back to Richmond, Virginia, with the Allans in 1820. Poe registered at the University of Virginia in 1826, but only stayed there for one year. He was estranged from his foster father at some point in this period over gambling debts Poe had acquired while trying to get more spending money, and so Poe enlisted in the United States Army as a private using the name Edgar A. Perry on May 26, 1827. That same year, he released his first book, Tamarlane and Other Poems. After serving for two years and attaining the rank of Sergeant-major, Poe was discharged. In 1829, Poe's foster mother Frances Allan died and he published his second book, Al Aaraf. As per his foster mother's deathwish, Poe reconciled with his foster father, who coordinated an appointment for him to the United States Military Academy at West Point. His time at West Point was ill-fated, however, as Poe supposedly deliberately disobeyed orders and was dismissed. After that, his foster father repudiated him until his death in March 27, 1834.
As Edgar got older he became interested in writing and poetry. He tried to pursue it as a career but John his adopted father wouldn’t allow it, he wanted Edgar to continue to run the tobacco business. By the age of 13 Poe had written enough poetry to publish a book but was again advised by Allan not to go down that path. Poe got fed up with his life in Richmond, living under Allan’s rules so he left to attend the University of Virginia. While at the University he did very well in all his classes but due to the fact that John didn’t provide him with enough money for his schooling he quickly went into debt. He attempted to gamble to try to pay off his college debts. Since that wasn’t panning out he retuned to Richmond and at 18 published his first book Tamerlane.
The more depress that he had become over the years, the more alcohol he consumed and destroy his body. “Edgar Poe died on October 7, 1849 in Washington College Hospital and some experts believe that alcoholism led to demise while others have other thought” (qtd. in Beidler). For example, in the story
Before the age of three, Poe was already an orphan after his Mother dying and his Father walking out on them (Frank 56). Poe was too young to remember his Mother since her death occurred when he was very young, but later in his life he grew resentful for being raised as a foster child. After the loss of his Mother, Poe would go on to experience the death of many more loved ones. This became the source of the terrible fear Poe would associate with death and dying, a common theme in many of his works.
At the young age of thirteen, Poe already had enough poetry to create a book. This just shows the extremely high artistic skills and intelligence Edgar Allan Poe had. Poe's young adult life was a depressing point in his life. It starts with Poe moved out of Richmond to attend the University of Virginia. He excelled in his classes but he accumulated a huge amount of debt. This was caused by the fact that Mr. Allan sent Poe to college with less than a third of the money needed to attend the college. In attempt to get by, Poe took up gambling to raise money but this ended up in a failure. His situation was so severe that he burned his furniture to keep warm (poemuseum.org). Poe felt humiliated by his his poverty and was angry with his foster father for not helping him with funding. He returned to Richmond to find out his fiancée Elmira Royster became engaged to another while Poe was away at school. With all these problems in his life, Edgar Allan Poe final stormed out of his home in Richmond to pursue his dream to become a great poet. He accomplished the first objective by publishing his first book Tamerlane when he was only eighteen
Poe was raised by his God parents after his parents died at the age of three. He was involved in Gambling and he also drank a lot. According to the Columbia Encyclopedia,
Poe’s life was falling apart: “Poe’s one refuge in life was threatened when Virgina (his wife) became ill with tuberculosis. When she died, Poe broke down completely” (Edgar Allen Poe, 180). Therefore he turned to alcohol to self-medicate his grief. Poe had a history with alcohol, his Uncle refused to take over his care when he was found sick in the tavern because of it: “He now refused to take over his care, saying that on former occasions, when drunk; Poe had been abusive and ungrateful” (Silverman, 185). The fact that Poe was not happy with his life and had alcohol issues show that on that day the reason he experienced those symptoms and died was because of the alcohol which he consumed in the
Edgar Allen Poe had a sad and troublesome existence. Being born in the early 1800s, life was a crapshoot at best. There were poor living conditions, which lead to many aliments and incurable diseases. Unfortunately for Edgar, he found firsthand how miserable life could be at a very early age. According to Biography.com Editors, Edgar’s father, David Poe Jr, was born in Baltimore, Maryland and studied acting as his career of choice. He shortly left Edgar and the rest of his family at an extremely young age. Considering Edgar was still a baby, his father leaving most likely didn’t led to any profound resentment as he moved forward through life. Another sad fate of Edgars was that he also never knew his mother. As mentioned early, diseases in
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) was an American poet and writer. Poe was born on January 19, 1809, in Boston, Massachusetts. His final days remain a mystery as he suffered from poor health and struggled financially. He was taken to Washington College Hospital, where he died on October 7th. His death was at the early age of 40 from unknown causes and Poe’s last words were “Lord, help my poor soul.” He was the son of Elizabeth Poe and David Poe, who were both professional actors. He had one brother and one sister. Their names were William Henry Leonard and Rosalie (Edgar Allan Poe Biography.com). He is predominantly known for his stories of horror and mystery and made his biggest mark in the genre of gothic fiction. Edgar Allan Poe wrote one of his
Soon after, Poe’s mother died of tuberculosis. Ironically within the next few days, Poe’s father also died of the same disease. After all of this, Poe and his two siblings were put into a foster care system (Grubbs #1). Any child that loses both parents, is separated from their siblings, and moves around throughout their childhood is bound to have some trauma. This series of difficult losses would begin Poe’s descent into loneliness.
Edgar Poe was born in Boston on January 19, 1809 to actors Elisabeth Arnold Poe and David Poe Junior. Edgar had a brother Henry, who was a year older than him, and a younger sister, Rosalie. His mother and father separated a couple months after Rosalie’s birth. When Edgar was two his mother passed away and a few weeks later his father died as well. As a result, Edgar and his siblings became separated. John Allan took in Edgar where he was christened as Edgar Allan Poe. Three years later the Allan’s moved to England where he attended Manor House School for three years. Even though Edgar performed very well in school, he only seemed to remember his school days in London as lonely and unhappy.