[Susan Foreman]

Continuing 'The Complete Tales And Poems Of Edgar Allen Poe':

'The Black Cat' (Horror, first published United States Saturday Post, August 1843) - The first story in the collection that deals with madness, is effectively told in two parts. The first part tells of a man who loves animals until he started drinking, and in a fit of rage, he tortures and later murders his beloved pet cat. Feeling guilty, he acquires an almost identical animal, which he begins to both hate and fear leading to the death of both the cat and his wife by an axe. To hide the crime, the bodies are wall up in the cellar...

There are numerous filmic adaptations of the story - some remain faithful to the source, while others merely use the title. Universal made two films entitled 'The Black Cat', one in 1934 with Lugosi and Karloff and another in 1941 with Lugosi and Rathbone. However, there are 'suggested' by the story rather than having any resemblance to the tale. Corman adapted it for the middle story in his 'Tales Of Terror' in 1962 and Argento used it for his segment in 'Two Evil Eyes' (1990). Fulci's 1981 film 'The Black Cat' is also loosely based on the story

'The Fall Of The House Of Usher' (Horror, first published in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine in September 1839) - The story tells of the unnamed narrator visiting an old childhood friend, Roderick Usher, who suffers from hypersensitivity to textures, light, sounds, smells and tastes), hypochondria and acute anxiety. It is also revealed that Roderick's twin sister, Madeline, is ill and falls into cataleptic, death-like trances. The narrator tries to cheer his friend up, but to no avail. Madeline dies, and is interned in the family tomb. However, during a ferocious storm, the tomb is smashed, and Madeline returns - Roderick knew she had been buried alive!

In addition to the main story, Poe also included the text to his 1839 poem 'The Haunted Palace' within the prose

The first film version of the story was a silent French piece, entitled 'La Chute de la maison Usher' in 1928, and there was a British version in 1947 (but not released until 1950). Corman made a version in 1960 although, possibly not wanting to give the ending away, he truncated the title to 'The House Of Usher'.

Although 'The Fall Of The House Of Usher' is regarded as being a gothic macabre masterpiece, I must admit that I find both the written story and the filmed version to be boring and hard to get through

'The Pit And The Pendulum' (Horror, first published The Gift: A Christmas and New Year's Present For 1843 in 1842) - Found guilty of an unspecified crime during the Spanish Inquisition, the narrator find himself being held prisoner in a pitch back cell. Trying to discover the actual dimensions of his imprisonment, he trips over and discovers a deep pit in the middle of the room. If he hadn't fallen over, he would have plunged into it! After losing consciousness, he wakes to find himself strapped to a table in the cell, which now has slight illumination. Above him is suspended a razor sharp pendulum, swinging from side to side and slowly...oh so slowly... descending towards his chest. Using blood from some meat he has been given to eat, he smears it over his bonds, enabling the rats in the cell to chew through his restraints, freeing him. The pendulum is withdrawn, and the walls start to move, pushing him towards the pit in the middle of the room...

The first film version of the story was the French 'Le Puits et le pendule' in 1909. The first English language adaptation was in four years later in 1913. Universal made 'The Raven' in 1935 with Lugosi and Karloff, which featured the pendulum torture device and Corman made 'The Pit And The Pendulum' in 1961

'The Premature Burial' (Horror, first published in Dollar Newspaper in July 1844) - The story is effectively told in two parts, beginning with an essay on catalepsy and giving three examples of (presumably) true cases of people who have been buried alive, and the ways tombs have been 'modified' to allow alarms to be set off to alert others. This leads to a piece of prose describing how the unnamed narrator thought he had been placed in his coffin while still being alive

Such is the mixture of 'real' and 'fantasy' in this story, I am uncertain as to whether it is an autobiographical piece by Poe or whether it is a piece of fiction

The fear of being being buried alive was a common one for Poe, and also appeared in other stories including 'Berenice', 'The Cask of Amontillado, The Fall of the House of Usher' and 'The Black Cat

Corman made 'The Premature Burial' in 1962 (with Ray Milland in place of the expected Vincent Price) and Fred Olen Ray made 'Haunting Fear' in 1991, based on the story and carrying the onscreen credit 'Edgar Allan Poe's Haunting Fear' despite it being very different from the story

'The Masque Of The Red Death' (Horror, first published in Graham's Magazine, May 1842) -

While avoiding a dangerous plague, known as 'The Red Death', Prince Prospero hides in an abbey, along with 1000 wealthy nobles. They are indifferent to the sufferings of the population at large, intending to wait out the end of the plague in luxury and safety behind the walls of their secure refuge, having welded the doors shut. To entertain his guests, the Prince holds a masquerade ball within the seven rooms of the abbey, each decorated with a different colour - blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet and finally black. Into their midst comes a stranger - a mysterious figure wearing a dark, blood-splattered robe resembling a funeral shroud and a mask resembling the rigid face of a victim of the Red Death...

Again, Corman made a film version of the story in 1964

'The Cask Of Amontillado' (Horror/Comedy, first published in Godey's Lady Book, November 1846) - The story's narrator, Montresor, tells of the day he took his revenge on Fortunato a fellow nobleman due to numerous injuries and an unspecified insult he has suffered. Montresor lures the drunk Fortunato to a private wine-tasting excursion in his cellar, and then chain him to the wall and bricks up the entrance. Unlike other murder stories by Poe, the killer get away with it, and in the last few sentences, he reveals that 50 years later, Fortunato's body still hangs from its chains in the niche where he left it

Corman incorporated the story into his version of 'The Black Cat' in the 1962 anthology film 'Tales Of Terror' and such is the writing of the story that I could easily picture Vincent Price and Peter Lorre as Montresor and Fortunato

'The Imp Of The Perverse' - (Horror, first published in Graham's Magazine, July 1845) - Another story that beings as an essay, suggesting that 'The Imp Of The Perverse' is the fact that people commit acts against their self-interest and have self-destructive tendencies. The tale itself concerns the narrator murdering a man with a poisoned candle. With no evidence, it is thought that his death was natural causes resulting in the narrator remaining unsuspected. One day, he notes that he will remain safe only if he isn't foolish enough to openly confess. Then he begins to question if he is capable of confessing...

'The Island Of The Fay' (Fantasy, first published in Graham's Magazine, June 1841) - This is an atypical Poe story. It is considered to be an example of a 'Plate Article' - a brief essay that was written specifically to accompany a magazines engravings. The ethereal tale tells of a man walking through the wilderness, where he comes across a small river with a circular island in the middle of it. He sits and watches a fay in a tiny canoe circling the island until she disappears

It's a beautiful story which should put paid to the suggestion that Poe only wrote horror stories. This is a tale that featured wiccan sensibilities many years before the word 'wiccan' existed!

A fay is another name for a fairy

'The Oval Portrait' (Horror, first published in Graham's Magazine, April 1842) - The shortest story in the collection, running just three pages, it fits in more ideas than many full length novels. The unnamed narrator, suffering from an unnamed injury, seeks refuge in a abandoned mansion. He finds himself enthralled by a portrait of a young girl, examining the picture for maybe a full hour. He consults a book for an explanation of the picture and learns that she loved and married an eccentric painter who cared more about his work than anything else in the world, including her. He asked her to pose for him, and she consented, sitting for many weeks as he painted her. However, he was so wrapped up in his task that he did not notice her fading health, and she (being a loving wife) continually smiled on, uncomplainingly. When he had finished his painting, he turned to his bride, only to discover that she had died

It's thought that elements of the story were used as inspiration by Oscar Wilde when he wrote the 1891 story 'The Picture Of Dorian Gray'