The Limits of Reason: Poe's Deluded Detectives

Abstract

N CANON OF FICTION preponderantly devoted to terror, disease, death, and revivification, Poe's tales of ratiocination provide a revealing counterpoint in their idealization of and sanity. During productive years I84I-44, Poe explored theme of rational analysis in various ways: three adventures of C. Auguste Dupin-The Murders in Rue Morgue (I841), Mystery of Marie Roget (I842-43), and Purloined Letter (I844)-established prototype of modern detective story by focusing on investigative methods of a master sleuth. Ratiocination led William Legrand to buried treasure in Gold Bug (I843) and enabled narrator of 'Thou Art Man' (I844) to solve a backwoods murder; analytical operations figured less prominently in A Descent into Maelstr6m (I841) and A Tale of Ragged Mountains (I844). But publication of Purloined Letter marked last of Poe's investigative fiction; none of tales after I844 returned to subject of ratiocination. Two basic questions to be considered here, then, are why Poe initially became interested in detective story, and why, after technical achievement of Purloined Letter, he abandoned genre, reverting to familiar materials of horror and grotesque. The significance of Poe's ratiocinative phase can perhaps be best understood in context of his broader thematic concerns. The search for figure in Poe's fictional carpet has produced myriad interpretations: Patrick F. Quinn has termed Doppelganger motif most characteristic and persistent of Poe's fantasies, while Edward H. Davidson states that central bifurcation in Poe lies between two sides of self, between emotion and intellect, feeling and mind. Harry Levin sees essential Poe hero as an underground man embodying reason in madness, while more recently, Daniel Hoffman has identified duplicity or the doubleness of experience as Poe's chief theme.! Behind evident