Pain and Pleasure

So after reading the Edgar Allen Poe story, A Descent Into the Maelstrom, I did not really understand how we were suppose to relate it to art or aesthetics. I guess that writing literature is a form of art in its own sense. The author is being creative and creating something to get his or her message out and or trying to appeal to the intended audience. The story about the old man walking along the cliff with the narrator who witnesses the great Norwegian Maelstrom emerging from sea ends with the message that the man with the white hair basically has to live with the burden of his great tragedy because no one will believe him.

After reading further on in the chapter, I realized the relationship between the Poe story and the Edmund Burke essay about tragedy. Burke says that pain and pleasure are simple ideas incapable of definition. He states that many people have the opinion that pain comes from the removal of some sort of pleasure. I think that this is somewhat true. If someone is starving, the removal of food and the gratification that comes along with it is removed, it beings hunger pains. Of course there are many other scenarios that you can relate that to. Burke states that he does not think that the emotions are necessarily dependent on each other. I think it depends on what sort of pain is being reflected onto the person. I thought that it was interesting to read how he related different emotions and other things bringing pain...but once again I am left asking myself, how does this relate to aesthetics and art?