Edgar Allan Poe and Abuse

Although most works of studies around Poe will never fully admit--Poe was a victim of abuse in several different manners. First, he was placed in foster care as a child rather than raised by his parents. His father abandoned the family and his mother died of tuberculosis, leaving Poe vulnerable to the foster system.

All throughout history, the foster system has never been kind to children. Other histories proclaim how Poe was sent to live with his mother's sister and husband, where he received affection from his aunt, but never his uncle: whom he actually longed for praise from. This is something one can speculate is a replacement for Poe's actual father, who walked out on the family when Poe was young or just the inherent need for a boy to require affection and praise from a father-figure. Poe never received it, and many can argue that could be a form of abuse--but is definitely a source of trauma.

Now, Poe had a history of mental illness but also drug and alcohol abuse and it's still debated today which one fueled the other. Did trauma launch the substance abuse that sparked the episodic behaviors--or did trauma affect the episodic behaviors that substances were used as self-medication?

Another question, Poe furthers the cycle of alcoholism from his father and uncle despite estrangement from that side of the family; and it's known that addiction is an illness of its own, so does trauma really play a part in Poe's addictions? Or does it only affect his art? The Tell-Tale Heart is a renowned piece by Poe where the narrator kills his male caretaker and buries his heart in the floorboards and the narrator slowly goes more and more insane throughout the story as he is being interrogated by police and feasted on by guilt before he turns himself in and exposes the murder and where the heart is located in the floor.

Majority of authors--fiction and nonfiction alike--will state that writing is a form of one's self and portrayal of their own thoughts, ideas, souls, etc.

Is The Tell-Tale Heart a grieving piece of the lover Poe never received from neither his father or uncle he lived with? The narrator kills the male caretaker out of fear and discomfort from the man's glass eye--is that something Poe felt towards the male caretakers in his actual life? Was his uncle so cold like glass that it caused him apprehension and fear? Did he wish, maybe metaphorically, he could hold the man's heart? Break through the ice?

Or, maybe, it has nothing to do with Poe's traumas at all. This is something I'd like to delve into within this notebook and future pieces.

Sources of information and to take a deep-dive in again later:

Poe's strain with his uncle: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/psychiatry-a-history/202304/the-troubled-life-of-edgar-allan-poe

Poe's experience between foster care and aunt and uncle (also brief history of his father and mother): https://www.morethanourchildhoods.org/stories/edgar-allan-poe/ Government website about Poe's medical history: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18064380/