Poe’s Sea Tales

When one thinks of Edgar Allan Poe, one thinks of gloomy lands, haunted mansions, or claustrophobic tombs. As Poe himself noted, the idea of being buried alive might be the most terrifying of all. But Poe’s writing also contains horrific imagery of the open sea and of the deep. The relationship between terror and the sea is made clear in such tales as “MS. Found in a Bottle,” “Descent into the Maelstrom,” and The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. The sea provides an important scene for Poe, and Poe shows that horror may be found as easily aboard a ship as in a haunted house.

“MS. Found in a Bottle,” Poe’s first published short story, establishes the sea as a classic location for horror. It tells of a man whose ship gets caught in a hurricane. After days of drifting on the storm-tossed