Authors of the Romantic period were known for their description and captivity in their writing; like William Wordsworth, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville. Although, none of them quite as known as Edgar Allan Poe. His writing, daring and memorable, is read to this day; he is the master of description.
When you hear the name Edgar Allan Poe, you usually think of his horror stories. Using description, he would capture his readers with his dark, twisted words, and use metaphors to relate to the world we know. Not many authors can relate to his unique writing; description was his secret weapon. "By the dim light of an accidental lamp, tall, antique, worm-eaten, wooden tenements were seen tottering to their fall, in directions so many and capricious, that scarce the semblance of a passage was discernible between them." In this passage from The Man of the Crowd, Edgar Allan Poe describes the lamp as tall, antique, and worm-eaten. He describes the tenements as wood falling in capricious ways. While reading his work, you can picture the scene as clearly as looking through a glass window. That's why many people would say that he is the master of description.
Authors like Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote more sensibly and never attempted to write as boldly as Edgar Allan Poe. For example, this section written by Nathaniel Hawthorne in The Marble Faun: "Nobody, I think, ought to read poetry, or look at pictures or statues, who cannot find a great deal more in them than the poet or artist has actually expressed." The difference in writing between the two authors is immense; description is not as essential in this genre as in the
