The Fall of the House of Usher And Other Tales: The Fall of the House of Usher;the Murders in the Rue Morgue;the Man of the Crowd;the Oval ... Tell-Tale Heart (Penguin audiobooks)

This collection of macabre stories includes "The Fall of the House of Usher", "The Murders in Rue Morgue", "The Man in the Crowd", "The Oval Portrait", "The Masque of the Red Death" and "The Tell-Tale Heart".

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49) was born in Boston and orphaned at an early age. Taken in by a couple from Richmond, Virginia, he spent a semester at the University of Virginia but could not afford to stay longer. After joining the Army and matriculating as a cadet, he started his literary career with the anonymous publication of Tamerlane and Other Poems, before working as a literary critic. His life was dotted with scandals, such as purposefully getting himself court-martialled to ensure dismissal from the Army, being discharged from his job at the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond after being found drunk by his boss, and secretly marrying his thirteen-year-old cousin Virginia (listed twenty-one on the marriage certificate). His work took him to both New York City and Baltimore, where he died at the age of forty, two years after Virginia.