Selected Tales
By: edited with an introduction and notes by David Van Leer.
Contributors: Van Leer, David, 1949-
Edition: Oxford World's Classics paperback edition (3)
Series: Oxford World's Classics
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1998
Place of publication: Oxford; New York
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 338
ISBN-13: 9780192832245
Copyright date: 1998
Subjects: Horror tales, American
Description: Edited with an Introduction and Notes by David Van Leer

Since their first publication in the 1830s and 1840s, Edgar Allan Poe's extraordinary Gothic tales have established many of the conventions which still dominate the genre of horror and detective fiction.

As well as being highly enjoyable, Poe's tales are works of very real intellectual exploration. Using the Gothic to question the integrity of human existence, Poe is less interested in moral retribution than in exposing the misconceptions that make things seem 'mysterious' in the first place. Attentive to the historical and political dimensions of these very American tales, this new critical edition selects twenty-four tales and places the most popular — 'The Fall of the House of Usher', 'The Masque of the Red Death', 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue', and 'The Purloined Letter ' — alongside less well-known travel narratives, metaphysical essays, and political satires.

• INTRODUCTION • TEXTUAL NOTE • BIBLIOGRAPHY • CHRONOLOGY • EXPLANATORY NOTES
--back cover
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [xxiii]-xxv).
UK/USA
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: Note on the Text; title: Select Bibliography; title: A Chronology Q/'Edgar Allan Poe; title: SELECTED TALES; title: MS. Found in a Ik)ttle; title: Berenice; title: Morella; title: Ligeia; title: The Man that was Used Up; title: The Fall ofthe House ofUsher; title: William Wilson; title: The Man of the Crowd; title: The Murders in the Rue Morgue; title: Eleonora; title: The Masque of the Red Death; title: The Pit and the Pendulum; title: The Mystery of Marie Roget; title: The Tell-Tale Heart; title: The Gold-Bug; title: The Black Cat; title: A Tale of the Ragged Mountains; title: The Purloined Letter; title: The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether; title: The Imp of the Perverse; title: The Cask of Amontillado; title: The Domain of Arnheim; title: Hop-Frog; title: Von Kempelen and his Disu»very; title: Explanatory Notes