Notes on “The Purloined Letter"

This story is the prototype of all detective stories, and it includes the prototypical characters:

• The master, amateur sleuth, who is brilliant but who also has odd notions – e.g. Auguste Dupin, Sherlock Holmes.
• The uninformed narrator, a friend of the sleuth, and a mediator with the reader – “the imperfectly informed narrator, the man with limited understanding of the events surrounding him” – a confused, ignorant, but trusty sidekick – e.g. Dupin’s friend, Dr. Watson
• A rival, yet helpless policeman; befuddled; good, but not creative; imcompetent; eventually consults the protagonist for help – e.g. G— (police prefect, commissioner), Lestrade (from the Scotland Yard)
• The clever, fiendish villain; a brilliant criminal – e.g. D—, Professor James Moriarty

The story also contains the prototypical structure for detective stories:

• Detective and accomplice
• The police visits and states the case
• The crime is solved
• A discussion of logic and reason
• The crime is explained

Another Key Word: “Ratiocination”

• “Writing that solves an enigma through logical processes.”
• “Logical reasoning.”
• “The process of reasoning from data to conclusions” --> “Induction”
• Arthur Conan Doyle (Sherlock Holmes) called this “deduction,” which can be confusing to first-time readers who are also familiar with logic.
• Sherlock Holmes deals with “causes --> effects.”
• Sherlock Holmes observes data and then tries to fit it into theories.
• Sherlock Holmes once said, “Eliminate all other choices; the one left must be true.”
• For Auguste Dupin, critics wonder if he is demonstrating “intuition,” rather than ratiocination.  (Remember, intuition is a key concept in transcendental thinking.)
• In this story by Poe, we know the criminal at the beginning.  This focuses the story on the problem of the recovery of the letter.  Thus, it focuses on the ratiocination.