Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Edgar Allan Poe is known as the inventor of detective fiction. He created the first fictional detective character named C. Auguste Dupin who first appeared in his short story The Murders in The Rue Morgue which was published in 1841. Dupin reappeared in his two other stories The Mystery of Marie Roger (1842), and The Purloin Letter (1844). Poe created the character of Dupin much before the term ‘detective’ was coined. Dupin displays many traits that were later copied by subsequent fictional detectives including Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot.
The Murders in The Rue Morgue is a short story and is the first published detective story and the first locked room mystery ever that was published in 1841 in Philadelphia literary journal Graham's Magazine and then in Poe's own 1845 short story collection Tales of Mystery and the Imagination.
Characters of The Murders in The Rue Morgue:
Monsieur C. Augustus Dupin is a young man of considerable intellect and creative imagination. He is living in Paris. He is not a professional detective but he has a desire for truth. He is a master of analytical reasoning who solves crimes by examining everything and by placing himself in the mind of the criminal. The unnamed narrator is an expatriate who is on an extended visit to Paris where he meets C. Auguste Dupin who happens to be his roommate. He becomes a close friend of C. Auguste Dupin. The narrator is intelligent but does not have the same insight as his associate. He chronicles the mysteries in a way that displays admiration for his friend's abilities. Madame L'Espanaye is an old woman who becomes a victim of a double murder at the Rue Morgue. She is found with her throat deeply slit and her body mangled. She has a daughter named Camille L'Espanaye who is found strangled and stuffed into a chimney in the double murder. Adolphe Le Bon is a bank clerk who once helped Dupin. He recently delivered four thousand francs to the L'Espanayes three days before their brutal murder. He is arrested despite a lack of evidence, and Dupin chooses to help him because he helped him in the past. The Sailor is a Frenchman from a Maltese ship, and he shows up at Dupin's door in answer to Dupin's ad seeking the owner of a lost Ourangutan. Monsieur G. Is the Perfect (high officer) of the Parisian Police. He is not as imaginative as Dupin. When Dupin offers him assistance in solving the double murder case, he accepts his help. Although he is not appreciative of the help.
Summary of The Murders in The Rue Morgue:
The story begins as the narrator offers a monologue and discusses the importance of analytical reasoning. To strengthen his argument about analytical reasoning, he offers an example, a story from his past when he was on an extended visit to Paris where he met Monsieur C. Auguste Dupin. Dupin is a poor young man though he splurges on books. The narrator first met Dupin in a library in Paris where they were searching for a rare book. Both became friends and decided to live together in seclusion in a gloomy old mansion. Since Dupin didn’t have much money, the narrator offered to pay the rent. The narrator was impressed by Dupin’s analytic abilities which Dupin attributes to his understanding of people's thoughts. Dupin shows his mental abilities by exactly guessing the narrator’s thoughts while observing his body language and recalling former conversations.
One day, the narrator sees a news article about a set of murders that had occurred that morning at three A.M. in the Rue Morgue. People heard screams from the fourth story of a house in the Rue Morgue belonging to Madame L'Espanaye and her daughter Camille. When they checked, they found that the house was locked from inside. Somehow, they broke in and they heard multiple angry voices from the upper portion of the house that soon faded away. As they searched the house, they found a locked room on the fourth floor of the house. They broke in and saw that the room was totally destroyed and contained, among other things, a bloody razor, clumps of grey hair, and two bags with four thousand francs in gold. The iron safe was totally damaged but it seemed as if nothing was stolen. Then they saw the fresh corpse of Camille L’Espanaye, the young girl whose body had been forced feet first into the chimney; her face was scratched, and her throat was bruised as if she had been strangled. They found the dead body of her mother, Madam L’Espanaye in the backyard with her throat so deeply cut, probably by the razor, that her head fell off when she was picked up, and with her body extremely mutilated by some heavy, blunt object.
The murdered mother and daughter were rich and very fond of each other. They were living in that house for over six years and they didn’t have any close living relatives. Some men claimed that on the night of the incident, they heard two voices from the fourth floor of the house. One of the voices was gruff, male, and French, and the other shrill, foreign, and strange. A witness confirmed that the French voice shouted, "sacré" (holy), "diable" (devil), and "mon dieu!" (My God!), but he couldn’t understand what the other shrill voice said.
A banker revealed that Madame L'Espanaye withdrew four thousand francs in gold three days before her death. Adolphe Le Bon was the clerk who visited L’Espanaye’s house to deliver the money. The police arrested Adoplhe as a suspect in the double murder despite lacking evidence.
When Dupin came to know about the case, he got very interested because he felt it was impossible and also because he was sympathetic to Adolphe Le Bon, the bank clerk who helped Dupin in the past. He criticizes the Parisian police for arresting Adolphe and decides to meet the Prefect of Police to obtain permission to investigate for himself. The Perfect is Monsieur G. whom Dupin knew well. He allows Dupin to visit the crime scene. Dupin and the narrator visit the Rue Morgue. Dupin examines all the evidence carefully and then they return to their mansion. The next day, Dupin asks the narrator if he saw something strange in the house of L’Espanaye and again criticizes the police for arresting Adolphe who Dupin believes is innocent.
Dupin says that the voices that people heard were not female and hence it could not have been a murder-suicide. He further exclaims that all the witnesses are of different nationalities but all of them identified the shrill voice as a foreign one. None could understand the words of the shrill voice. Dupin then says that the room was on the fourth floor and it was locked from inside. The murderer must have disappeared through the windows in the chamber. He says that the windows must have a concealed spring that allows the windows to fasten themselves. He further says that though it is difficult to climb up the wall for the fourth floor, someone of extraordinary athletic ability could have climbed up a nearby lightning pole and jumped onto a window shutter. He further asserts his belief in Adolphe’s innocence and says that the motive of money is unlikely, since no one took the money, and the bureau's drawers might not actually be missing any articles.
The narrator asks him who could be the murderer to which Dupin answers that the culprit is one with an unidentifiable voice, superhuman power, and agility, a penchant for butchery, and no significant motive. He says that no human could have so much power to stuff the daughter so firmly up the chimney, pull such great clumps of hair from the old lady's head, or slit the lady's throat with so much force from a razor. He also says that the old woman’s body was mangled which might have happened because she fell from the window of the fourth floor to the backyard. The police ignored it because they believed that the window was sealed. The narrator interjects and says that the culprit must be a madman. Dupin then shows him a few hairs that he collected from the fingers of Madame L'Espanaye. He says that the hair is of the culprit that Madam L-Espanaye caught while struggling against her. He says that the hair is not of any man.
Dupin then draws a sketch that exactly depicts the bruises and fingernail marks on the victim's throat. Dupin mentions that the fingernail impressions suggest that the throat of the victim was held and strangled by a huge hand, too large for a man. He then suggests that maybe it was the paw of an Orangutan. Dupin says that when the Orangutan was attacking the ladies, the other man, who probably was the owner of the Orangutan, shouted "Mon Dieu." He must have been horrified and probably tried to stop the Orangutan and save the ladies, but he failed.
Dupin then informs the narrator that he found a ribbon featuring a sailor's knot that is common among the Maltese. He says that the other man must be a sailor from Malta who own an Orangutan. He might have used the sailor’s knot to climb up the lighting pole. Thus, Dupin devices a plan. He issues an advertisement in the newspapers that says that he has taught an Orangutan and the owner may contact him to take the animal back. As expected, the French sailor arrives at the narrator’s mansion. As the sailor enters, Dupin locks the door from inside and then shows his pistol to the sailor and commands him to tell the truth about the deaths at the Rue Morgue. Dupin says that he believes that the Sailor too is innocent but it is a must for the sailor to confess what he witnessed to save Adolphe who has been wrongly accused of the double murder.
The French sailor admits that he caught an Orangutan in Borneo and he was expecting to sell it at a high price. The Orangutan once noticed the sailor shaving his beard by using a razor. On the same night, the Orangutan broke free and was holding the same razor. The sailor tried to control the Orangutan by using a whip but that angered the animal and it ran away. The sailor followed the Orangutan to the Rue Morgue and saw him climbing on the lighting pole from where it jumped into the fourth floor of the house of L’Espanaye. The sailor used a sailor’s knot and climbed up to the window, but he was slow. From the window, the sailor saw that the two women were arranging some papers into the iron safe when the Orangutan appeared and attacked the old woman with the razor and seized her hair. The girl was horrified and she fainted. As the old lady screamed in pain and horror, the Orangutan got enraged and he slit her throat and strangled the girl. The sailor shouted in disbelief and horror but his shout threatened the Orangutan too and in fear, the animal rampaged nervously, damaging the room and dragging the mattress from the bed. The Orangutan then shoved the body of the girl into the chimney and angrily threw the body of the old woman to the window from where the sailor was watching him. The sailor got away and climbed down through the lighting pole. The Orangutan too escaped out from the window before anyone could see it and the windows got locked back when it got out by the spring lock system.
Dupin takes the sailor to the police where he offers his statement. The police notice that neither Adolphe Le Bon, nor the sailor are culprits and they release them both. However, Monsieur G. Is embarrassed and he shouts at Dupin and tells him not to interfere in police matters again. Dupin ignores Monsieur G. and tells the narrator that the police Perfect is too cunning and ingenious, but he lacks analytical ability. Later on, the sailor recaptures the Orangutan and sells it to a zoo.
So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American English Literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!
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