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Actor/scholar Michael Oakes exhumes America’s most haunting author, combining details of his tragic life with passages from his poems and prose.

“A novelist need have no care of his moral. It is there, somewhere, and the moral and the critics can take care of themselves,” Poe wrote. However, his own life story provides powerful moral lessons about alcoholism, and the heartbreaking struggles of a singular artist.  He also said, "There are certain themes of which the interest is all-absorbing, but which are too entirely horrible for the purposes of legitimate fiction."  Poe went on to break literary boundaries by exploring those very themes, pioneering the detective, thriller, and horror genres. The mystery surrounding Poe’s death is befitting this dark literary genius.