full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Scott Peeples: Why should you read Edgar Allan Poe?
Unscramble the Blue Letters
Although he’s best known for his short horror stories, Poe was actually one of the most versatile and experimental writers of the nineteenth curnety. He inentved the decteitve story as we know it, with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” followed by “The mterysy of Marie Roget” and “The Purloined lteetr.” All three feature the original armchair detective, C. Auguste Dupin, who uses his genius and unusual powers of observation and deduction to solve crimes that baffle the police. Poe also wrote satires of social and literary trends, and hoaxes that in some cases anticipated science fcotiin. Those included an acconut of a balloon voyage to the moon, and a rrpeot of a dying paitent put into a hypnotic trance so he could speak from the other side. Poe even wrote an adventure novel about a voyage to the South Pole and a treatise on astrophysics, all while he worked as an editor, pnrducoig hundreds of paegs of book reviews and literary theory.
Open Cloze
Although he’s best known for his short horror stories, Poe was actually one of the most versatile and experimental writers of the nineteenth _______. He ________ the _________ story as we know it, with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” followed by “The _______ of Marie Roget” and “The Purloined ______.” All three feature the original armchair detective, C. Auguste Dupin, who uses his genius and unusual powers of observation and deduction to solve crimes that baffle the police. Poe also wrote satires of social and literary trends, and hoaxes that in some cases anticipated science _______. Those included an _______ of a balloon voyage to the moon, and a ______ of a dying _______ put into a hypnotic trance so he could speak from the other side. Poe even wrote an adventure novel about a voyage to the South Pole and a treatise on astrophysics, all while he worked as an editor, _________ hundreds of _____ of book reviews and literary theory.
Solution
- pages
- century
- producing
- detective
- letter
- patient
- mystery
- account
- report
- fiction
- invented
Original Text
Although he’s best known for his short horror stories, Poe was actually one of the most versatile and experimental writers of the nineteenth century. He invented the detective story as we know it, with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” followed by “The Mystery of Marie Roget” and “The Purloined Letter.” All three feature the original armchair detective, C. Auguste Dupin, who uses his genius and unusual powers of observation and deduction to solve crimes that baffle the police. Poe also wrote satires of social and literary trends, and hoaxes that in some cases anticipated science fiction. Those included an account of a balloon voyage to the moon, and a report of a dying patient put into a hypnotic trance so he could speak from the other side. Poe even wrote an adventure novel about a voyage to the South Pole and a treatise on astrophysics, all while he worked as an editor, producing hundreds of pages of book reviews and literary theory.
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
| collocation |
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| edgar allan |
2 |
Important Words
- account
- adventure
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- armchair
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