Review: Edgar Allan Poe: The Enigma, The Genius
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 02 26, 2014
This was originally reviewed (along with every single story inside this anthology) over at alex-hurst.com, in the series "Tackling Poe". Naturally, to leave a review of everything here would be far too long!I finished reading Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales & Poems about a week ago, but I wanted to give myself some time to digest everything, watch The Raven, and to formulate my final thoughts.To start off, I think that––overall––this collection was fairly good. I did have some issues with it, as I’ve talked about before in some of the earlier parts of this massive review series. I really didn’t like that each story was just a sub-chapter of a larger heading, and formatted in a way that you couldn’t keep track of how much time was left in each segment (I often use this when I’m trying to justify staying up late or reading more during a break), and there were a few incorrectly classed pieces under the Essays section.The compiler of the work did do a very good job formatting the poetry and fiction prose. They used true type, so even on the Kindle, it made for very lovely reading. Little embellishments, like unique titles, made the anthology look more polished.I would have liked to have seen more context notes, because some of the stories and poems made a great deal more sense with the context I was able to glean from the internet (after only moderate searching). Since all of Edgar Allan Poe’s works are public domain, and free, I expect more of an anthology, in this regard. In many cases, the poetry or fiction notes that Edgar Allan Poe wrote to his editors at the time were not included with the stories, to the detriment of quite a few of them.However, I know that to compile and format an anthology of this size and breadth is near impossible to do without some technical errors, and as most of my complaints were merely stylistic and subjective, I can recommend this anthology to most readers. Nothing will compare, I think, to seeing Poe’s works on paper (and being able to find quotes at a glance), but this is a close second. The section in the back which lists references to derivative or inspired works was very interesting. Much respect to Maplewood Books.The anthology is a beast, totaling over 407,000 words total.Now that I’m finally at the end of the collection, I would like to offer a list of recommendations. I’ll choose ten of his “classics”, ten “unknowns”, and fifteen poems which I do not think are well-known (of course everyone knows to read “The Raven”, “Annabel Lee”, “Lenore”, and so on). All of these are entirely subjective, but I think if you read nothing else but some of the thirty five I suggest here, you’ll have fairly good luck in reading something you’ll enjoy. They are in no particular order.The Classics:1. The Fall of the House of Usher2. The Black Cat3. A Descent into Maelström4. The Gold-Bug5. The Oval Portrait6. The Cask of Amontillado7. The Pit and the Pendulum8. Ligeia9. The Tell-Tale Heart10. BereniceRelatively Unknowns:1. The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar2. Loss of Breath3. William Wilson4. The Premature Burial5. King Pest6. The Spectacles7. The Business Man8. The System of Doctor Tarr & Professor Fether9. The Colloquy of Monos and Una10. The Power of WordsPoems:1. The City in the Sea2. Eldorado3. For Annie4. The Bells5. The Conqueror Worm6. The Haunted Palace7. In Youth I Have Known One8. Imitation9. The Valley of Unrest10. Tamerlane11. Sonnet – To Science12. The Forest Reverie13. The Village Street14. Alone15. Israfel