摘要：The present research, in light of the comparison between the narrative techniques, aesthetic thoughts and themes of Poe’s works with those of Modernist writers, attempts to argue that Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), the famous American short story writer, poet and critic, is one of the most important forerunners of Modernism and that Poe’s works have provided the writers in the mainstream of the Modernist movements with literary inspirations and theoretical bases. Both the works of Poe and those by the Modernist writers depicted the alienated and isolated characters subject to self-fragmentation and self-destruction in a world of wasteland devoid of any meaning and significance. Poe’s strong sense of spiritual alienation and isolation in society embodied in his literary protagonists provided a perfect model for the Modernists. The Poe-cult was initiated by Charles Baudelaire, the French Symbolist poet, but his influence upon Modernism spread to the major “isms” in the European continent where Expressionism, Symbolism, Surrealism, Futurism and Stream of Consciousness burst into fabulous flower on the stage of literature and art.
