Edgar Allen Poe: a 19th century genius or a literary madman? Confusion, fear, wonder, shock and horror: just a few words among many to describe the emotions that Edgar Allen Poe's tales are known to evoke. Critics say Poe was far ahead of his time in his ability to examine the human psyche and create characters that truly make the reader think, even recoil in horror. One particular theme that Poe repeats quite often is that of madness and madness. He is known for his wonderfully twisted stories involving characters such as an unstable brother with a mysterious illness (The Fall of the House of Usher), a methodical murderer (The Tell-Tale Heart), and a raging, revenge-seeking homicidal maniac (The Cask of Amontillado.) Through analysis and quotations from the tales listed above, in conjunction with the opinions of literary critics, the reader will clearly see the oft-repeated theme of madness and insanity at the work. Madness seems to inject itself into Poe's tale. , The Fall of the House of Usher, from the very beginning. The narrator of this tale begins by using comparisons and extremely detailed descriptions of Roderick Usher's house, to relay the "unbearable sadness" and "total depression of the soul" (654) that he feels when he sees the place for the first time. He describes the exterior, with its “empty eye-shaped windows” and “white decaying tree trunks” (654). Literary critic Victor Strandberg states that Poe "unequivocally describes the dark mansion as representing the house of the psyche." Strandberg believes that the references refer to Usher's mysterious mental state and that Poe's intention to compare the two are solidified by Usher's account of his "Haunted Palace." Roderick Usher states in "The Haunted Palace" that his house was "middle of paper... denying that Montressor represents a particular type of evil." He is consumed by revenge and takes the necessary measures to put into practice the madness within him. Edgar Allen Poe may be both a 19th century genius and a literary madman. His stories mentioned here, of mystery and murder, are full of madness, instability and the ramblings and actions of mentally deranged psychopaths. Although its themes are numerous and the motivations of the characters are always open to interpretation, the theme of madness and insanity seems to grip the reader and draw them directly into the story. Critic Patrick McGrath ends his essay "Method to the Madness" by stating: "The reader who has been successfully enlisted as a kind of psychiatric detective will find himself grappling with minds blind to their own dysfunction, which also makes them rich in complexity than any in our literature.”