Stephen Mark Rainey

It has been nearly two centuries since Poe left to the world a trove of literary treasures that have inspired generation after generation as few other purveyors of the written word ever have. He created frequently beautiful, always mysterious, and oftentimes hideous fantasy worlds in prose and poem; fathered at least an entire genre that to this day flourishes; has been flattered by literal hordes of imitators (of which only a handful, including H. P. Lovecraft, have achieved noteworthiness); and in the last half-century has become virtually synonymous with Vincent Price.

In Evermore, 15 writers examine Edgar Allan Poe from as many different perspectives. Some as biographers who afford us glimpses into the poet’s life, as if to convince us that they know certain secrets — some forebidding and some alluring — that no one else possibly could; others as participants in Poe’s own dreams, living and breathing within the worlds he created.