<P> Beyond horror, Poe also wrote satires, humor tales, and hoaxes . For comic effect, he used irony and ludicrous extravagance, often in an attempt to liberate the reader from cultural conformity . "Metzengerstein" is the first story that Poe is known to have published and his first foray into horror, but it was originally intended as a burlesque satirizing the popular genre . Poe also reinvented science fiction, responding in his writing to emerging technologies such as hot air balloons in "The Balloon - Hoax". </P> <P> Poe wrote much of his work using themes aimed specifically at mass - market tastes . To that end, his fiction often included elements of popular pseudosciences, such as phrenology and physiognomy . </P> <P> Poe's writing reflects his literary theories, which he presented in his criticism and also in essays such as "The Poetic Principle". He disliked didacticism and allegory, though he believed that meaning in literature should be an undercurrent just beneath the surface . Works with obvious meanings, he wrote, cease to be art . He believed that work of quality should be brief and focus on a specific single effect . To that end, he believed that the writer should carefully calculate every sentiment and idea . </P> <P> Poe describes his method in writing "The Raven" in the essay "The Philosophy of Composition", and he claims to have strictly followed this method . It has been questioned whether he really followed this system, however . T.S. Eliot said: "It is difficult for us to read that essay without reflecting that if Poe plotted out his poem with such calculation, he might have taken a little more pains over it: the result hardly does credit to the method ." Biographer Joseph Wood Krutch described the essay as "a rather highly ingenious exercise in the art of rationalization". </P>

Which of the following is not presented as part of poe’s biography