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  • This course regularly costs $127.
  • A $20 Early Enrollment Discount will be applied if you purchase this course before November 15th, 2025 at 11:59 PM EST.
  • This course has 24 seats remaining.

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Course name
Edgar Allen Poe’s Tales and Poems
Live course taught by Henry Russell for Spring 2026 High School Survey Literature
Summary

 Enter the mysterious world of Edgar Allan Poe, a man who was both a super-rationalist and a spiritual thinker, who was amazingly practical and endlessly impractical.  Through close readings of Poe’s most haunting tales and poems, students will explore themes of beauty, mortality, terror and the human soul—discussed with a Catholic lens that encourages deep reflection and critical thinking.

Course description: Poe is one of America’s most fascinating, most praised and most read authors.  Each story is a different mix of trying to explain the world rationally and psychologically, and yet always bordering on or moving fully into a world that seems supernatural.  Poe is intoxicated by beauty but always dreading some horror that may lie beyond.  Only in his poem to the Virgin Mary is there a complete peace.

Instructor: Dr. Henry Russell

Total classes

7

Class dates

Thursdays, January 8 to February 19, 2026

Starting time

10:00 AM Eastern (9:00 Central; 8:00 Mountain; 7:00 Pacific)

Duration

55 minutes

Prerequisites

None

Suggested grade level

9th through 12th grade

Suggested credit

½ semester American or Modern Literature

Outline

Course outline:

First Session:  Biography

Second Session:  The Murders in the Rue Morgue

Third Session: The Tell-Tale Heart

Fourth Session:  A Cask of Amontillado

Fifth Session:  Poems

Sixth Session: The Fall of the House of Usher

Seventh Session:  The Fall of the House of Usher

Materials

  • The Essential Stories & Poems of Edgar Allan Poe (illustrated).  ISBN: 1703239288 (https://amzn.to/4jfclfF or BookFinder.com)

Homework

An hour to an hour and a half’s reading per class.  Computer-graded quizzes and final for immediate feedback.

Fees

Fee: For all 7 classes: $107 if you register on or before November 15; $127 if you register after Nov. 15. (Registration closes one week before the first day of class. After that date, registrations are not guaranteed. There is a $25 surcharge for late enrollments after the course is closed.)