Customer Reviews

The Unabridged Edgar Allan Poe: The Conqueror Worm/The Fall of the House of Usher/The Murders in the Rue Morgue/The Pit and the Pendulum (Courage Unabridged Classics)

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This is the litmus test that all other Poe books are measured by. This book has ALL of Poe's poems,stories, mysteries ect. all in chronological order, so you can see before your very eyes, the development of a pure genius. With his early writings you can see exactly how his path takes him from POEtry (the true art form, Poe's own words) to the more popular short story of his time (more profitable at the time). The stories and poems go from the popular (The Raven) to the obscure (Lines on Ale). He even shows you a side of himself that the majority of people never knew existed in his scathing reviews of other author's work. This book is not for the wishy-washy reader who is interested in nothing more than to produce a book report. It's for the bare knuckles,in from the rain, out of the storm, hide the kids, take the phone off the hook and turn out the lights because I wanna read until my hair stands on end, and I want my mommy cause I outta my mind with horror, kind of reader. It's bursting with many different types of stories and reflections. I absolutely loved this book and constantly find myself finding new parts of the book that I haven't read yet. It's easy to lose yourself in this book (over 1100 pages) and never have to worry again about missing another Poe story for the rest of your sleepless nights. Don't be mistaken about this book, if you don't have it, you haven't really read Poe. Quoth the Raven "Nevermore"!

--This is THE best and most complete collection of Poe's work you will find anywhere. Not only is it everything he's published in the order it was published, it also includes the first versions of works he later altered and otherwise removed passages from. There are rare pieces here that I've been unable to find anywhere else. I challenge you to find "Lines on Ale" or a complete version of Poe's play "Politan" in any other "Complete" collection of his work. Poe often included phrases in other languages in his stories and they are all translated here in brackets. Easy to read print and a pleasure to hold. (Plus, the new gold-leaf is fun to crack when you first open it.)
--If I have to say anything negative about this, it's the illustrations (which is quite trivial, really) which appear one to the beginning of each story. They seem to be inked in ball-point pen and the artist doesn't quite have a knack for figure drawing. Other than that, the only other gripe is that the picture heading off his most famous murder mystery, depicts the murder in-progress. But again, it's trivial.
--Overall, it is the definitive collection of Poe's work to own, bound in a handsome volume for a lifetime of reading.

I (heart) Poe!!! Years ago I stumbled on this unabridged Edgar Allan Poe. Got it for my birthday a few months later, and it went with me everywhere, even to summer camp! The only bad thing is, the copy I had, the paperback edition, well, the binding DID NOT hold up. It is impossible to expect a paper binding to hold together nearly 1200 pages of the macarbe. So, long story short, my formerly sinlge volume paperback copy is now in 4 volumes. I made the mistake of buying "the complete tales and poems of E.A. Poe" that was published by B&N, it is not anywhere near complete, and the order of that book drives me crazy. I eneded up leaving that copy on the shelf to look prettier and reading my old beater copy instead.

So, in short,
DON'T get the paperback copy, you will be sad.
DO the Running Presses hardback copy.
DON'T get the "complete" thing from B&N, again, you will be sad.
AND chronological order ROCKS

This was a gift for my grandaughter.she loved it,the service and condition were wonderful thanks

Edgar Allan Poe's storys and poems are one that will scare you, thrive and grab your attention within seconds of reading. The best one i think is the Raven I started to read and i couldnt put the book back down.

When I received this book, its pages stuck together and it was damaged. The "leather" doesn't even look or feel like leather. There's gold tint on the outside of the pages, and the gold rubs off on your hands and clothes when you're reading the book.