In this NortonCritical Edition, G. R. Thompson has fully introduced, annotated, andedited each text.

Backgrounds and Contexts includes fifty-seven carefully chosendocuments that illuminate Poe’s prolific but short career, among themreviews, prefaces, and correspondence by Poe as well as thematic piecesdealing with Transcendentalism and alternative romanticism, sciences ofthe mind, sensation fiction, and the South and slavery.

Fourteen judiciously selected critical essays address Poe’s poetry,fiction, politics, and psychology. Contributors include Floyd Stovall,Robert C. McLean, Richard Wilbur, James W. Gargano, Joseph J.Moldenhauer, Paul John Eakin, Grace Farrell, Liahna Klenman Babener,Barton Levi St. Armand, Joseph N. Riddel, J. Gerald Kennedy, JohnCarlos Rowe, Terence Whalen, and John T. Irwin.

A Selected Bibliography is also included.