In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart", the narrator tries to prove his sanity after murdering an elderly man because of his "vulture eye". His growing guilt leads him to hear the old man's heart beating under the floorboards, which drives him to confess the crime to the police.

This book contains: The tell-tale heart The premature burial Landor's cottage The Imp of the perverse The cask of amontillado The colloquy of Monos and Una The fall of the house of Usher The pit and the pendulum

The Tell-Tale Heart strips away myths that have grown up around the life of Edgar Allen Poe, providing a fresh assessment of the man and his work. Symons reveals Poe as his contemporaries saw him – a man struggling to make a living and whose life was beset by tragedy, such that he was driven to excessive drinking and unhealthy relationships.

When Edgar, the mischievous toddler, accidentally breaks a statue while roughhousing with his sister, he must decide whether to tell their mother the truth--and Lenore must decide whether or not to tattle.

A new selection for the NEA’s Big Read program A compact selection of Poe’s greatest stories and poems, chosen by the National Endowment for the Arts for their Big Read program. This selection of eleven stories and seven poems contains such famously chilling masterpieces of the storyteller’s art as “The Tell-tale Heart,” “The Fall of the House of Usher,” “The Cask of Amontillado,” and “The Pit and the Pendulum,” and such unforgettable poems as “The Raven,” “The Bells,” and “Annabel Lee.” Poe is widely credited with pioneering the detective story, represented here by “The Purloined Letter,” “The Mystery of Marie Roget,” and “The Murders in the Rue Morgue.” Also included is his essay “The Philosophy of Composition,” in which he lays out his theory of how good writers write, describing how he constructed “The Raven” as an example.

In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Spectacles", a vain young man, neglecting his need for glasses, falls in love at first sight. He later discovers that the woman he has fallen in love with is his great-grandmother, revealing a biting irony about perception and reality.