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WYKŁAD 22.11.2010

Poe’s ways of writing:

liad genius when he was wealthy

had strong ambitions and enormons capacity for work

used liis experience in his writing

he meticulously revised wliat he regarded his best work

had a logical mind (analyzing literały works in a magazine he edited- one of the best critics of liis day)

the chief aim of the story writer should be to create an effect upon the readers mind and feelings

tlie writer should first decide what effect he wanted to create, and then should make every event and word help achieve it

Poe was a master of atmosphere, picturing and suspense(like todays psycho-thrillers)

Poe invented tlie detective story: Tlie Tatiocinative’ tale The devices used in it:

a brilliant detective

tlie device of tlie ‘ baffled friend’ - tlie detective’s companion is not good at Solutions. Tlie detective tells liim the story.

At the end - the detective discloses his surprising solution and elucidates’ - step by step tlie reasoning tliat led to it.

By eliminating all tlie impossibilities, you amve at tlie tmtii The foil is ratlier stupid

-    The official guardians of the law are blundering and unimaginative

-    The locked room' convention

-    The unjust suspicion

Deduction by putting ones self in anothers position.

Poes contribution to literaiy theoty :

PoetasaMaker

The philosophy of Composition’ or ‘ How IW rotę the Raven’ (1846) -famous account of Poe’s poetic practice

Eveiy effect is planned, poetry is not spontaneous, it is strategie Tliere are no accidents, no effects of inspiration

Poe’s poetry:

ideał subjects of poetiy: beauty, melancholy and death beauty - is ‘the essence of the poem’

-    sadness - is the tonę of beauty's ‘highest manifestation’

has musical pattems uses incantation, hypnotic rhythm, and verbal melody, creating a sense of mystety

repetition of sounds

the poet shares the world beyond phenomenal experience, like priest, sliaman. or magician with almost divine knowledge, leading readers to the Promised land’, so tliey forget the ordinary world - for example, the poem ‘Dreamland’.

Poe s tlie mes:

may be connected with the mental State of the author, but do not explain the work itself

confinement

burdeli of a doubt

death - of a beautihil woman. tlie seductive naturę of deatli

beauty

alienation

loss, despair

violence

double self (split-personality)

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