2.1 Poe’s Life Experience and Its Influence on His Writings
Edgar Allan Poe was born in 1809 in Boston and died in 1849 in Baltimore. His forty years of life span seems like a tragic journey. He was orphaned at the age of two because of the disappearance of his father and the death of his mother. Then he was adopted and taken into the home of John Allan who was a wealthy merchant, but he was never adopted officially. He ever received education in Virginia and England, and then served as an enlisted man in the army for two years. Poe entered West Point in 1830, but was expelled in 1831 because of his excessive drinking. From then on his education days were ended. In 1836, he married his cousin, a 13 years old girl. However, after his wife died in 1847, he drank heavily and was addicted to the use of opium. Then he suffered loneliness, intoxication, and illness, and he died two years later after his wife. All his life was filled with difficulties. He ever suffered from depression and madness. Drinking too much alcohol had a negative effect on him.

Poe’s literary creation had been profoundly influenced by his rough life experiences and his arduous and tortuous writing career. His tragically disordered life is reflected in his stories and poems, most of which are unreal but the product of his imagination. Some of his works describes beauty and love, while the most contents of his works are depraved and images are whacky. His works describes not only abnormal psychology, but decay and death with pessimism and mystery surrounded. A lot of his stories happened in an ancient castles, in the ruined temples, even in the sepulchral vaults. Characters of his works refer to mad aristocrats, self-torture killers, and odd people of abnormal psychology. Therefore, it is not hard to say that his tragic experience has a great impact on his writing.

2.2 The Classification of Poe’s Works
During his short life, Poe has contributed to the world seventy short stories, fifty poetries along with some literary criticism. At present, the academic circles has divided Poe’s works into four major types including horror story, detective story, science fiction as well as literary criticism. The masterpieces of his poems are The Raven and To Helen. Among all his short stories, four can be ranged among masterpieces; they are The Black Cat, The Fall of House of Usher, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Masque of the Read Death. What’s more, Poe creates Detective story, which contributes greatly to the emerging style of science fiction, such as the famous William Wilson and the Tell-tale Heart. Furthermore, he makes several influential theoretical statements on poetry and short story, surveys abnormal psychology which is consistent with the Freud’s theory and his poetic principle has a deep impact on the French symbolism. Poe is a creative writer, suffering from difficulties, but still opening a new approach that nobody has tried before. His achievements and contribution in the literary theory and literary composition deeply influence the later writers.

He is also the first author who elaborates the theory of Gothic novels systematically and convincingly. It has been widely acknowledged that Poe is a typical author who applied gothic style into most of his works. Also he plays a significant role in the American Romantic Movement. There is no doubt that, in the eyes of public, he is one of the best masters of the gothic genre. His short stories are full of weirdness and fanaticism, haunted by an atmosphere of terror. The sets in his fictions are mainly in the old mansions, in deep cellars or in old castles, and the images of major characters suffer from schizophrenia. His fictions, with their descriptions of outside environments to and those inner hearts, they leave readers a sense of horror and death. They are like a distorted mirror that reflects human’s masochistic, cruelty, and abnormal psychology. The Fall of House of Usher is a classic example of his short stories. This work combines Poe’s own writing techniques with Gothic writing elements. It shows readers what the characteristics of Gothic writing are and how Poe develops them and creates his own style. 试论爱伦•坡的哥特式风格以《厄舍古屋的倒塌》为例(3):http://www.751com.cn/yingyu/lunwen_1470.html