Introduction: This explosive period in literature, which happens to be my favourite, was a direct and intense reaction to the "sensibility" and "rationalism" of the Age of Enlightenment. Writers in this period gloried in the beauty of wild, untamed and pure nature... and in the complexities of the human mind itself. Sometimes dark, always emotional and very evocative. Ah, this time period was passion: raw, painful and sometimes self-destructive passion. Everything in the arts, if it be musical or artistic or literary, was intense. And this intensity, which is most pronounced in the gifted, could push some over the edge...
Locations: The Life and Death of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) What Romantic tour would be complete without him! He is the perfect example of the tortured genius. Our first location will be where he was born in 1809: Carver Street, Boston, Massachusets (yes, he was American). His father abandoned the family when Poe was one, and his mother died of consumption (TB) when he was two. In this location, a museum for him (like in many places he lived in) has been built. The second location we visit will be the University of Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson, where Poe started studying languages in 1826. At that time, the university was in total chaos, with a high dropout rate. Poe's gambling debts and excessive drinking finally caught up with him: having no money for schooling, he left after attending for one year. It's here that we can grab lunch. Sadly, for the next location we must fast-forward over his troubled and anguished life (which included time in the army, lost love, family deaths, writing, more debt, disownment, court-martialling, more death, alcohilism, incest, popularity, two marriages and an engagement, and penury) to the streets of Baltimore. It was on those streets, in October of 1839, that Poe was found delirious and incoherent... and not in his own clothes. There is a memorial where he was found. Our last location in his life will be, strangely, where he died: Washington College Hospital on Broadway and Fayette Street. Many theories exist on the causes of death: suicide, murder, delerium tremens (caused by alcohol), heart disease, epilepsy, meningeal inflammmation and rabies. We can eat supper at the Raven's Perch along the same road that the great Edgar Allan Poe breathed his last, and discuss the links between the literature and art of the Romantic Period.
Above: Edgar Allan Poe suffered from Manic Depression
Above: Edgar Allan Poe's Birth Memorial
Above: The Memorial in Baltimore
