Did Edgar Allan Poe Cut Off His Ear?
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There is no viable proof that poet, Edgar Allan Poe, cut off his ear. Poe did attempt suicide in 1848, according to Listverse, and he died on Oct. 7, 1849 of unknown causes. The painter Vincent Van Gogh was an artist who actually did cut off his own ear.
Art critic Robert Hughes says that Van Gogh repeatedly experienced periods of extreme desperation and despair. It was during one of these periods that Van Gogh made the famous amputation, later giving the severed ear to a prostitute. Van Gogh, like Poe, was suicidal; however, unlike Poe, he was successful, dying of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.