The Murders In The Rue Morgue, first published in 1841, has been recognized as the first detective story, as it defined so many elements of the genre. Indeed, the word detective did not exist when he wrote it. Author Edgar Allan Poe certainly presents a brilliant observationalist, a curious narrator friend, a baffling crime in a locked room, and a solution so bizarre only the sharpest mind could imagine from the impossible clues provided.
Of course, I was excited to read a classic of the genre, but... I realized at the finale... I had actually read this before! I might have forgotten the story, but there is no forgetting the culprit!
After a rambling treatise on the analytical mind, we read in the newspaper an account of murder on a side street so small, a mother and daughter live alone in the only house. In a locked room on the fourth floor, there is found a disaster of broken and torn furnishings, the daughter strangled and shoved upside down in the chimney and the mother thrown out the window, her throat so slashed her head falls off. Ok, do I have your attention?
The conflicting tales of the witnesses and their whereabouts are detailed in the newspaper, which intrigues Monsieur C. Auguste Dupin and his friend. Knowing the Prefect of Police, they simply ask to see the scene of the crime, and the deduction begins. Dupin opines that: when everything seems impossible, that impossibility itself must be the truth.
Yes, there is a solution, and it is so bizarre I can't believe I would have forgotten.
It fits, and it's original, but...pretty far fetched. The detective M. Dupin is a little too pompous for me, and I didn't feel a chance at the solution. The 'Golden Rules' of detection collectively agreed upon by the best mystery writers of the 1930' and 40's (including Dorothy Sayers, Agatha Christie and others in The Detection Club) include presenting all the clues needed for the reader to solve the case by at least the first third of the story. Ellery Queen went a bit further with his eponymous detective stories, actually inserting a chapter in the book at that point which summarized all the clues - addressing the reader directly and daring them to guess the solution!
I mean to say, Morgue is a mystery you don't solve, you just sit back and listen.
Mr. Poe, I give you all the credit for introducing and popularizing the detective genre, and for packing so much adventure into so short a story, but this for me remains a quaint curio.
Mystery buffs will be entertained.
This has been adapted many times for radio, TV and film. There are several sites online where you can read or download this for free.
1841 / Hardcover / 47 pages
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