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About Tamerlane (Unabridged)

"Tamerlane" is a poem written by Edgar Allan Poe when he was only 17 years old. Based on a fictionalized account of the 14th century conqueror known as Tamerlane, it was first published in the 1827 collection Tamerlane and Other Poems . The choice of an eastern figure by a western writer was unusual for that era. In the poem, the protagonist sacrifices his love for a young woman in order to pursue a life of conquest, but on his deathbed he regrets the decision. The poem’s main themes of pride, loss, and exile may have been inspired by the author’s loss of his young love, his birth mother, and his foster-mother. "Tamerlane" was influenced by the works of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and especially Lord Byron, notably the drama Manfred and the poem "The Giaour".