By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Oval Portrait’ (1842) is one of the shortest tales Edgar Allan Poe ever wrote. In just a few pages, he offers a powerful story about the relationship between art and life, through the narrator’s encounter with the oval portrait of a young woman in a chateau in the Appenines. The story repays close analysis because of the way Poe offers his story as a subtle commentary on link between life and art.