Monday, January 19, 2009: At the Westminster Church Cemetery in Baltimore, a birthday party is taking place to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of the enigmatic master of the macabre, the American writer, poet, and critic Edgar Allan Poe.
Next to his grave, a Black Cat stands guard.
Midnight tribute, three red roses, and a bottle of cognac: once again there, as mysteriously happens on his birthday for the past 60 years.
The Ravens, the Worms, and the Demon of Perversity applaud.
The black-clad Patriarch of Mystery smiles sardonically from his grave.

The dark world of Edgar Allan Poe, through three stories:
"The Black Cat." An iconic work of Poe, the delirium of a man who - like the author himself - is dominated by the demon of drink and by an incomprehensible desire of the soul to harm itself, to do evil for the sake of evil...

"The Pit and the Pendulum." A work about non-death, about the morbid anxiety of the mind not so much fearing to see horrific things, but fearing that it might suddenly face nothingness...

"The Premature Burial" and the undead, those who are buried while still alive... The unbearable pressure of the lungs, the fumes of the damp earth, the touch of the shroud, the suffocating narrowness of the space, the darkness of absolute Night, the sea of silence, the invisible but palpable presence of the Conquering worm...

... and through the unique and darkly atmospheric illustrations of Luis Scafati (nominated for the Hans Christian Andersen Award 2009, with works exhibited in Barcelona, Frankfurt, and Madrid, and part of major museum collections in Buenos Aires.)