LITERATURE AND THE CITY
NARRATIVE
&
GENRE
Cecilia Tsang
Abstract:
My essay is a close-text analysis and comparison of Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Murders in the Rue Morgue’ and Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’. The purpose of this project is to answer the questions of how and why Poe’s text is more Gothic, whereas Doyle’s text is more consolatory. My argument is that Poe was influenced by his predecessors who specialised in Gothic writing. I would show that Gothic writing was popular because it was a natural reaction to the social conditions of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and a representation of people’s psyches under such conditions. On the other hand, I would argue that Doyle’s story adopts a more escapist style in order to comfort readers that faced the tumultuous and ever-changing social conditions caused by modernisation. Finally, I would link the arguments of my essay to the contemporary situation by leading readers to rethink what our media might want us to believe about our reality.
Grace Park
Abstract:
Coming Soon...
The Collaboration between Dupin and the Narrator
May Wu
Abstract:
In “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”, the narrator is portrayed as a less ingenious figurewho accompanies Dupin along the whole story. The narrator only responds to Dupin generally, echoes his messages and positions Dupin as an unattainable genius to readers.The invention of a less intelligent narrator or a detective’s close companion has become akey feature in many detective stories. Their main functions are to characterize theunreachable analytical skills of the detective and to stimulate reader’s participationsthroughout the story. . In the article of “Death as Truth in Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murdersin the Rue Morgue””, Kozaczka claims that Dupin is the “autonomous master of his ownnarrative” and that he actually renders the narrator as a text that he can manipulate andcontrol (62). However, I argue that Kozaczka overlooks the significance of the narratormerely because he is a less intelligent figure than Dupin. I argue that the narrator is equallysignificant and ingenious as Dupin. The narrator is dedicated to illuminate the brilliant sideof Dupin by consciously diminishing himself while Dupin is responsible for demonstratinghis unattainable analytical skills to the readers. Together they complete a page turningdetective story to the readers.