Abstract: Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most unique writers in America. When most litterateurs of his same age were reveling in repeating romantic tones, Poe’s themes were mainly about decayed castles, terrifying gothic plots and morbid characters which always shocked who read them. Though not understood by the public who lived in the same era with him, Poe and his works are increasingly taken seriously with the growing popularity of horror stories in modern society. But as people read Poe’s horror stories, they often doubt what they can benefit from them except a great fear. So this paper tries to look for positive influences of Poe’s horror stories from the perspective of readers. Concrete, this paper is divided into four parts. Part one is an introduction, in which Poe’s literary status, the reasons why he writes horror stories and relative literature review will be introduced; Part two gives an introduction of reader-response criticism’ a literature theory that I will apply to what follows; Part three presents three kinds of positive energy triggered from Poe’s horror stories on the basis of reader-response criticism. They are to release negative emotion, look inward and improve yourself; Part four is a conclusion part. According to the analysis above, we come to such a conclusion: Poe’s horror stories do have distinctive value of existence. By reading them, readers will find a proper form to let off their repressed moodiness. At the same time, readers will also do some self-reflection when reading in order to adjust and perfect themselves in reality.
Key Words: Edgar Allan Poe; horror stories; positive energy; reader-response criticism

摘  要：埃德加•爱伦•坡是美国独树一帜的作家之一。当同时期的大师们仍陶醉于浪漫主义的美梦时，坡却以没落的古堡﹑惊悚骇人的哥特情节及病态扭曲的人物性格演绎出一出又一出的心灵的恐怖。虽然他没有得到同时代的人的理解与赏识，但在恐怖小说日渐流行的今天，坡的作品越来越得到人们的关注与重视。人们在阅读其恐怖小说的同时也在思索着：除了巨大的战栗之外，它还能为我们带来什么？因此，本文试图从读者的角度来寻爱伦坡的恐怖小说能为读者们所带来的积极意义。本文共分为四大部分。第一部分主要介绍爱伦坡的文学地位，探讨其创作动机并且对相关的国内外研究概况的阐述；第二部分重点研究读者反应批评的相关理念，而这些理念会被运用到下文的文本分析中；第三部分将在文本基础上从读者反应角度揭示爱伦坡的恐怖小说引发的三重正能量,分别是释放负面情绪、审视自我内心与调整完善自我。第四部分为结论部分。通过以上分析，本文得出以下结论：爱伦坡的恐怖小说存在独特的正面价值：读者通过阅读其恐怖小说，不仅为自己的压抑情绪找到了合理的宣泄方式，并且在阅读过程中会进行自我反思，从而在现实里不断完善自己。
关键词：埃德加•爱伦•坡；恐怖小说；正能量；读者反应理论


  Horror themes and positive energy are two popular elements at present. Horror themes mean something that can terrify people while positive energy is something that extensively means all the motivations and feelings giving people hope when they are helpless, encouraging people when they are in difficulty and urging people to seek a better life. In other words, positive energy, originally a physics term, now is equal to positive influence. From the meanings of horror themes and positive energy, they seem quite opposite to each other. But on the contrary, people usually get positive energy from horror themes. Over the long history of literature, Edgar Allan Poe may be the first one who is so good at concealing positive energy in horror themes to create his unique horror stories.