It's also a favourite of various French postmodernist philosophers who for some reason have selected this story to argued extensively over its structure, symbols and signifiers in terms that most of us mere readers are unable to follow. It's a story most like the mysteries produced by crime writers to come-the most accessible, and my favourite, of the three Dupin tales by Poe. "The Purloined Letter" is told less ponderously than the other two stories, despite Dupin (Poe really) going on a bit ponderously about poetry and mathematics, and the characters, established now, lock horns more entertainingly. Here we have the early development of the classic armchair mystery, in which we see our hero mainly listen and think-and later reveal all to the astonished narrator-though Dupin does indulge in one influential bit of undercover sleuthing that climaxes the tale. In this case, an element of intrigue is added, as Dupin's help is enlisted to recover a stolen document that could prove embarrassing for the government. It may be the best and most tightly written story of the three, so much so that Arthur Conan Doyle uses much of the plot and style for one of his most famous Sherlock Holmes stories, "A Scandal in Bohemia".Īs with its predecessors, "The Purloined Letter" shows Poe trying something a little diffferently with each story. Auguste Dupin, after "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" and "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt." ("The Gold Bug", written around the same time may also be considered a mystery, but it does not involve Dupin.)
It's the second sequel featuring Poe's French sleuth C.
If "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" is called the first detective story, then "The Purloined Letter" is the third or fourth, depending on which Edgar Allan Poe's stories of ratiocination, as he called them, you count. CRITIQUE | THE TEXT Introducing the armchair detective
0 kommentar(er)
