Poetic Effect and Cultural Discourses

This collection of essays by a group of scholars from Germany, the United States, Russia and the Czech Republic focuses on the relations of E.A. Poe's work to various forms of cultural discourse as well as on its intercultural and intermedial repercussions. One of the central concerns of this conference volume is the question of how a cultural reading of Poe's literary fictions can account for their character as 'tales of effect'. The scope of investigation ranges from the cultural significance of animal representations and the aesthetic consequences of Poe's interest in mesmerism and scientific cosmologies to the uncovering of archeological strata in The Gold Bug, the exploration of temperance rhetoric in The Black Cat, and the engagement of the public-private dichotomy in The Pit and the Pendulum. Furthermore, the role of Beauty in Poe's aesthetic and the process of poetological self-construction are discussed, as well as the illustrations for the poem To Helen and, finally, the influence of Poe's writings on Russian symbolism. Bisherige Forschungsgebiete des Autors: Science and literature; text and image; literary theory.