Never Bet the Devil Your Head

Edgar Allan Poe's short story Never Bet the Devil Your Head frequently labelled A Story With a Moral was first published in 1841. The satirical story parodies transcendentalism and mocks the idea that all literature should have a message. Transcendentalism is explicitly attacked in Never Bet the Devil Your Head when the narrator refers to it as Toby Dammit's sickness. The transcendentalists are actually sent a bill for Dammit's burial costs by the narrator but they refuse to pay because they don't believe in evil. Poe denied that he had any specific aims despite mentioning transcendentalism and its leading publication The Dial specifically. He did however express a dislike for transcendentalists elsewhere referring to them as Frogpondians after the pond in Boston.