Literary compliment – Mark Twain and Edgar Allan Poe

Works of American writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) were not very well received at the time when Poe was alive. Poe's stories and poems were especially despised by writer and journalist Mark Twain (1835-1910) who once in a letter to his friend wrote:

“To me his prose is unreadable—like Jane Austin’s. No, there is a difference. I could read his prose on salary, but not Jane’s. Jane is entirely impossible. It seems a great pity that they allowed her to die a natural death.

Another thing: you grant that God and circumstances sinned against Poe, but you also grant that he sinned against himself—a thing which he couldn’t do and didn’t do.”