Ambiguity as Aesthetic Strategy: Edgar Allan Poe's Ambitions for the American Short Story

Abstract

Ambiguity as Aesthetic Strategy:Edgar Allan Poe's Ambitions for the American Short Story Wanlin Li* (bio) Edgar Allan Poe's significance as a short story writer has been duly noted by critics. The voluminous criticism his stories received (and continue to receive) attests to the widely acknowledged importance of the writer. However, in comparison with his individual works, Poe's devotion primarily to short story writing in his brief but very productive career has elicited far less attention. Critics sometimes refer to the market potential of the genre as a strong motivation,1 which is at least partly true, but we must take into account nonfinancial considerations as well. Otherwise, we may not be able to explain why Poe decided to stay with the genre when other contemporary short story writers, such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, gradually shifted to novel writing. Nor does the market theory of Poe's genre choice adequately explain why Poe showed such unswerving commitment to the genre in theory, praising its aesthetic value at every turn. To answer these questions, we need to place Poe's creative and critical efforts with respect to short story writing in a larger transatlantic context, in which American writers felt compelled to justify the distinctiveness and independence of American literature. Contrary to popular belief, I believe that Poe embraced the idea of a national literature as eagerly as many renowned literary nationalists, but instead of advocating thematic localization, Poe supported formal innovation, and turned to the short story as the primary [End Page 164] medium through which he could achieve his individualized ambitions for American literature. Understanding Poe's idiosyncratic vision for American literature has consequences for interpreting his literary theories and practices. Poe's aesthetic theory emphasizes the unity of effect and proposes a compositional model characterized by strong authorial control as a means for achieving such unity. Specifically, in order to produce a premeditated effect on the reader, the author needs to orchestrate his or her narrative resources in perfect coordination and leave nothing to chance. This compositional model gives the author the greatest advantage when he/she operates in a short medium. As a result, it allows Poe to foreground the generic merits of the short story in comparison with its British rival, the serialized novel (see the last section for a more nuanced argument and analysis). The latter's discursiveness, in Poe's eyes, greatly undermines its aesthetic quality. Governed by a new aesthetics, the short story stands for a literary medium through which American literature can achieve generic distinction. Not surprisingly, Poe's own creative efforts were geared towards demonstrating the power of such an aesthetic model, namely, how a writer can craft his or her stories in particular ways to produce vivid effects on the reader. Among the various strategies Poe designed for this purpose, ambiguity seems to be a most unlikely (though not infrequent) choice, since ambiguity,2 referring to the coexistence of mutually exclusive meanings, seems, on the surface, to work against the unity of effect. But if we recognize Poe's underlying desire for control, we would realize that ambiguity actually works for Poe's purpose, since it strengthens authorial control by way of forcing the reader to grapple more with parallel interpretive possibilities. In other words, in cases of ambiguity, Poe seeks the unity of effect not at the level of stable meaning, but at the level of making the reader aware of instability. To illustrate how ambiguity works in specific contexts, I offer my readings of several of Poe's fantastic stories, including "Ligeia," "The Fall of the House of Usher," and "William Wilson," in analyses that foreground the irresolvable nature of their ambiguity, before I move on to interpret the significance of the ambiguity in relationship to Poe's aesthetic theory and his nationalistic ambition to outstrip British literature. My readings will hopefully bring an end to the efforts to resolve the apparent ambiguity in Poe's fantastic stories, as critics recognize how ambiguity serves the author's larger theoretical and historical goals. [End Page 165] The Irresolvable Ambiguity in "Ligeia" The ambiguity in "Ligeia" has been a source of continuing controversy in the critical history of...