A writer's name usually brings to mind a definite place, country or person. Edgar Allan Poe's name evokes no such clear image but rather a mood, a dim unquiet atmosphere of dungeons and dank tombs, of ill-fated beings, doomed decaying houses and unearthly mysteries. Poe was our first great writer of spine-chilling, macabre, and grisly tales - and he is still the master. He also wrote our first detective and science fiction. Even more than that he was a brilliant critic and a remarkable poet. This volume includes his best stories - "The Fall of the House of Usher," "The Pit and The Pendulum," "The Purloined Letter," and many others - with a selection of Poe's choicest poems. In addition, Poe himself is the subject of a fascinating introduction, written especially for this book by Laura Benet, author of The Young Edgar Allan Poe. The telltale heart; The masque of the red death; The cask of Amontillado; Metzengerstein; The pit and the pendulum; The fall of the house of Usher; The black cat; A tale of the ragged mountains; The oblong box; The murders in the Rue Morgue; The purloined letter; MS. found in a bottle; The oval portrait; Berenice; A descent into the maelstrom; Thou art the man; Mystification; The sphinx; The imp of the perverse; The premature burial; William Wilson; The assignation; Ligeia; Morella; Shadow; The conversation of Eiros and Charmion; Silence; Selected poems: The raven; The bells; Ulalume; Eldorado; Israfel; Annabel Lee; To Helen; To my mother.