A long, but superficial study of Poe. It is not hard to label many of Poe's writings as sadistic, but the only light the author throws on

this feature is the circumstance that Poe, like millions of other people, spent a few years in an English school and therefore was perhaps beaten in childhood. Following Brill, she connects some of his traits, especially the craving for affection, with the fact he was an only child. But for the most part the work is a mere translation of his personal and literary attributes into a mixture of Freudian, Adlerian and Jungian terminology and contributes little to an understanding of their psychogenesis.