Looking for inspirational quotes by the American author Edgar Allen Poe? We have rounded up the best collection of Edgar Allen Poe quotes, sayings, poems, and writings (with images and pictures) to inspire you about love, life, humanity, insanity and more.
Edgar Allen Poe was an American poet, author, editor, and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement.
Also See: Theodore Roosevelt Quotes
He was best known for his horror and mystery tales. Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre.
He is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction. Here are some deep Edgar Allan Poe quotes from his best works.
Top 10 Edgar Allan Poe Quotes
- “I smiled,—for what had I to fear?” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “We loved with a love that was more than love.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Never to suffer would never to have been blessed.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I intend to put up with nothing that I can put down.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I was never really insane except upon occasions when my heart was touched.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.” – Edgar Allan Poe
Famous Edgar Allan Poe Quotes On Love
- “And all I loved, I loved alone.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “To elevate the soul, poetry is necessary.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Love like mine can never be gotten over.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Convinced myself, I seek not to convince.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Reaching out to her is like drinking from a memory.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “For eyes we have no models in the remotely antique.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Deep in earth my love is lying/And I must weep alone.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The memory of a past happiness is the anguish of today.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Years of love have been forgot, in the hatred of a minute.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore…” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Misery is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “My heart beat calmly as that of one who slumbers in innocence.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “A feeling, for which I have no name, has taken possession of my soul.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And so being young and dipped in folly I fell in love with melancholy.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “…the agony of my soul found vent in one loud, long and final scream of despair.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Because it was my crime to have no one on Earth who cared for me, or loved me.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “A short story must have a single mood and every sentence must build towards it.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor, Shall be lifted — Nevermore!” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be touched without emotion.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “That man is not truly brave who is afraid either to seem or to be, when it suits him, a coward.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The depth lies in the valleys where we seek her, and not upon the mountain-tops where she is found.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I am walking like a bewitched corpse, with the certainty of being eaten by the infinite, of being annulled by the only existing Absurd.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “From childhood’s hour I have not been As others were – I have not seen As others saw – I could not bring My passions from a common spring.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “That pleasure which is at once the most pure, the most elevating and the most intense, is derived, I maintain, from the contemplation of the beautiful.” – Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe Quotes On Life And Happiness
- “Art is to look at not to criticize.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Even in the grave, all is not lost.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “For all we live to know is known.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The best things in life make you sweaty.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There is an eloquence in true enthusiasm” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There is no beauty without some strangeness.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I felt that I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It is far more easy to get up than to come down.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Sleep, those little slices of death — how I loathe them.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “With me poetry has not been a purpose, but a passion.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The customs of the world are so many conventional follies.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “A million candles have burned themselves out. Still I read on.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “To die laughing must be the most glorious of all glorious deaths!” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I dread the events of the future, not in themselves but in their results.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Happiness is not to be found in knowledge, but in the acquisition of knowledge.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best have gone to their eternal rest.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The death of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “All religion, my friend, is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination, and poetry.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Beauty of whatever kind, in its supreme development, invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It is the nature of truth in general, as of some ores in particular, to be richest when most superficial.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There are few cases in which mere popularity should be considered a proper test of merit; but the case of songwriting is, I think, one of the few.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “No pictorial or sculptural combinations of points of human loveliness, do more than approach the living and breathing human beauty as it gladdens our daily path.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The true genius shudders at incompleteness — imperfection — and usually prefers silence to saying the something which is not everything that should be said.” – Edgar Allan Poe
Best Edgar Allan Poe Quotes On Dreams And Reality
- “Invisible things are the only realities.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I wish I could write as mysterious as a cat.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The scariest monsters are the ones that lurk within our souls.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “All suffering originates from craving, from attachment, from desire.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There is no exquisite beauty…without some strangeness in the proportion.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “If you are ever drowned or hung, be sure and make a note of your sensations.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “He who pleases is of more importance to his fellow man than he who instructs.” – Edgar Allen Poe
- “I would define, in brief, the poetry of words as the rhythmical creation of beauty.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “To vilify a great man is the readiest way in which a little man can himself attain greatness.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The idea of God, infinity, or spirit stands for the possible attempt at an impossible conception.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Decorum — that bug-bear which deters so many from bliss until the opportunity for bliss has forever gone by.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Actually, I do have doubts, all the time. Any thinking person does. There are so many sides to every question.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Art was, for Poe, the only method by which one could penetrate the shapeless empirical world in the search for order.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There are certain themes of which the interest is all-absorbing, but which are too entirely horrible for the purposes of legitimate fiction.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It is evident that we are hurrying onward to some exciting knowledge—some never-to-be-imparted secret, whose attainment is destruction.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “In the Heaven’s above, the angels, whispering to one another, can find, among their burning terms of love, none so devotional as that of ‘Mother.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The ninety and nine are with dreams, content, but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “In our endeavors to recall to memory something long forgotten, we often find ourselves upon the very verge of remembrance, without being able, in the end, to remember.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The object, Truth, or the satisfaction of the intellect, and the object, Passion, or the excitement of the heart, are, although attainable, to a certain extent, in poetry, far more readily attainable in prose.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn,—not the material of my every-day existence–but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “There are two bodies — the rudimental and the complete ; corresponding with the two conditions of the worm and the butterfly. What we call “death,” is but the painful metamorphosis. Our present incarnation is progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full design.” – Edgar Allan Poe
Quotes by Edgar Allan Poe About Mind And Insanity
- “Be nothing which thou art not.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Stupidity is a talent for misconception.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “To observe attentively is to remember distinctly.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Mysteries force a man to think, and so injure his health.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It would be mockery to call such dreariness heaven at all.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “On the morrow he will leave me as my hopes have flown before.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I remained too much inside my head and ended up losing my mind.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Man’s real life is happy, chiefly because he is ever expecting that it soon will be so.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Science has not yet taught us if madness is or is not the sublimity of the intelligence.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “I have before suggested that a genuine blackguard is never without a pocket-handkerchief.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “If you wish to forget anything on the spot, make a note that this thing is to be remembered.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “A judge at common law may be an ordinary man; a good judge of a carpet must be a genius.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And have I not told you that what you mistake for madness is but over-acuteness of the sense?” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “In criticism, I will be bold, and as sternly, absolutely just with friend and foe. From this purpose nothing shall turn me.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “It will be found, in fact, that the ingenious are always fanciful, and the truly imaginative never otherwise than analytic.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “If we cannot comprehend God in his visible works, how then in his inconceivable thoughts, that call the works into being?” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Men have called me mad; but the question is not yet settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence…” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The pioneers and missionaries of religion have been the real cause of more trouble and war than all other classes of mankind.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “The result of law inviolate is perfection–right–negative happiness. The result of law violate is imperfection, wrong, positive pain.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “To him, who still would gaze upon the glory of the summer sun, there comes, when that sun will from him part, a sullen hopelessness of heart.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Experience has shown, and a true philosophy will always show, that a vast, perhaps the larger, portion of truth arises from the seemingly irrelevant.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Whether people grow fat by joking, or whether there is something in fat itself which predisposes to a joke, I have never been quite able to determine…” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “We want characters – characters man – something novel – out of the way. We are wearied with everlasting sameness. Come drink! the wine will brighten your wits.” – Edgar Allen Poe
- “There are few persons who have not, at some period of their lives, amused themselves in retracing the steps by which particular conclusions of their own minds have been attained.” – Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe Quotes From The Raven
In the New York Mirror of January 29, 1845, appeared, from advance sheets of the American Review, Allan’s most famous poem, “The Raven,” which gave him national fame at once.
- “Quoth the Raven, ‘Nevermore.’” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Darkness there and nothing more.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; This it is, and nothing more.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor shall be lifted—nevermore!” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore! Quoth the Raven, ‘Nevermore.’” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!’ I shrieked, upstarting— Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer, Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “’Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,’ I said, ‘art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore —’” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “From my books surcease of sorrow- sorrow for the lost Lenore- For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore- Nameless here forevermore.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door— Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—Perched, and sat, and nothing more.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, ‘Lenore?’ This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, ‘Lenore!’— Merely this and nothing more.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore— Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore. Quoth the Raven ‘Nevermore.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, ‘Sir,’ said I, ‘or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore’.” – Edgar Allan Poe
- “For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door— Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door, With such name as ‘Nevermore.’” – Edgar Allan Poe
The tragedies and struggles Poe faced during his early life combined with the influence of Romantic literature brought about a style of Gothic writing that was unique to Poe.
He published several masterpieces, some of which include references to neurological diseases.
Poe suffered from recurrent depression, suggesting a bipolar disorder, as well as alcohol and drug abuse, which in fact led to his death from complications related to alcoholism.
If you like these inspirational quotes, then also check our collection of vegan quotes and kill them with kindness quotes to inspire you to be kind and positive in all situations.
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