English Prof. and author Emily Ogden’s upcoming book, “Darkness Becomes Bright: On the Brief Life and Immortal Art of Edgar Allan Poe,” offers an unparalleled window into Edgar Allan Poe’s life, chronicling his growth into one of literature's most lauded figures, his one-of-a-kind storytelling and his visceral effect on readers.
Poe famously attended the University as part of only its second class in 1826, though he had only been enrolled for less than a year. His brief stint on Grounds is a testament to the University’s literary prowess, and has since been immortalized with his preserved former room.
In addition to teaching poetry at the University, Ogden researches literature, and her Sept. 29 release will dive into Poe’s history — examining exactly how he changed lives with his writing. Ogden began her research for “Darkness Becomes Bright” in 2021, and a year later began the three-year writing process, concluding her work in the summer of 2025.
From thematic throughlines to direct references to psychoanalysis, “Darkness Becomes Bright” is anchored by a focus on three key figures. In her research, Ogden encountered both analytical and biographical works from Poe-inspired authors who described their relationship with Poe’s work. Ogden’s research was supported by a $40,000 grant from the Whiting Foundation, which rewards “deeply researched and imaginatively composed nonfiction.”
“We have a surprising amount of information about first readings of Poe, what it felt like to run into him, often as a child,” Ogden said. “Two of the three figures who I focus on in addition to him encountered Poe as a child and read him, and then went on as adults to write about him.”
One such writer that Ogden features heavily in her book is Julio Cortázar, an Argentine-French short story writer born in 1914, 65 years after Poe’s death. An ode that Cortázar wrote during his childhood borrows the rhyme-scheme from one of Poe’s most famous poems, “The Raven,” taking the theme of loss present in the original poem and flipping it to express his belief that Poe will never be forgotten. Cortázar was later hired by UNESCO as a freelance translator in the 1950s, and translated Poe’s writing into Spanish. His versions are widely considered to be the finest and most poetic translations of Poe’s stories.
“I found that at Princeton's library, they preserved a notebook that Cortázar wrote when he was 12 years old … The last poem is an ode to Edgar Allan Poe,” Ogden said. “When he's an adult, he goes on to write this incredible translation of all of Poe's stories after he'd already done his own writing.”
Another author Ogden features is the former French Princess Marie Bonaparte — a descendant of Napoleon and a patient of Neurologist Sigmund Freud in the 1920s — who, according to Ogden, found Poe so disturbing as a child that she avoided his work until her 40s. While working on psychoanalysis with Freud, Bonaparte began to read Poe once again, aiming to deliberately scare herself. Ogden said Poe had such a significant impact on Bonaparte’s psyche that his stories still terrified her decades after reading them.
Bonaparte eventually authored her own psychoanalytical biography of Poe in 1933. According to Ogden, “Darkness Becomes Bright” compiles accounts from Bonaparte’s journals to an extent that has never been seen before, delving into Bonaparte’s work with Freud and their use of Poe in exploring her personal fears.
The third major literary figure deeply researched in Ogden’s work is French poet Charles Baudelaire, who spent 14 years translating Poe’s work into French, popularizing it across Europe in the 1850s.
Through analyzing Poe’s resonance with writers across distinct timeframes and specializations, Ogden’s work proves how universal many of Poe’s common themes can be.
“The story of the book is the story of why horror helps people to live with things in their lives that they find difficult to face, and what allowed Poe in his own life to be able to write the things that he wrote and what they meant to people,” Ogden said.
Ogden’s initial passion for “Darkness Becomes Bright,” however, was not based on secondary sources, but a personal fascination with Poe’s character portrayals, including those of individuals who would traditionally be seen as villains. “The Tell-Tale Heart” is one of Poe’s works highlighted in the book, which presents the first-person perspective of a killer in an effort to humanize the character in an unsettling, often misunderstood way.
“In talking to people about Poe, I would encounter people who really wanted to push him away and wanted to say, ‘Okay, this is just a dream somebody had. This is a madman. This is a drunk,’” Ogden said. “And I really wanted to figure out how to articulate why I don't think that's the right thing to do.”
Ogden said her research revealed a strong sense of loyalty in Poe’s readers, which then became a central theme of her book. To do justice to Poe’s story and impact, Ogden said her work had to include the stories of famed authors who had been moved enough by Poe’s work to continue to engage with him throughout their own careers.
“He grabs people and doesn't let them go, and means different things sometimes at different points in their lives … Something about him really inspires loyalty,” Ogden said.
Her choice to focus her research on Poe was not only personal but also practical — Ogden said Poe’s popularity lent itself to her analysis given she could assume audiences had some established familiarity with his work. Still, Ogden said her work looks to connect with readers with ranging knowledge of Poe. Whether they are scholars of the author or simply curious about him with little to no knowledge of his work, Ogden is confident that there will be new takeaways for readers to find and appreciate in the book.
“I really am interested in reaching the Poe-curious, and even people who don't think that they like Poe because he can be a little bit much,” Ogden said. “It's also a book for people who just like to think about why literature matters to us or want to encounter stories of what reading can mean to people.”
Representing a culmination of five years of Ogden's authorial journey, “Darkness Becomes Bright” releases digitally and physically Sept. 29.
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