Friday, January 19, 2007

Why Poe?

From "The History of the Mystery"
by Carolyn Hart (www.carolynhart.com)
InSinC: The Sisters in Crime Newsletter, Vol. XIX, No. 4

Elements of the mystery are present in much literature, both ancient and modern, but the world waited until Edgar Allan Poe for the first true mystery stories....Poe...create[d] the first amateur detective, Auguste Dupin....[T]he modern mystery traces its beginning to the publication in 1841 of The Murders in the Rue Morgue. All of the elements necessary for a mystery novel were first gathered together in fiction by Poe:


  • The amateur detective whose exploits were chronicled by an admiring friend
  • The locked room mystery
  • An innocent suspect in jeopardy
  • Careful detection through following clues fairly offered
  • A trap laid for the true villain
  • The solution through the efforts of the detective
  • The first series character

All of this was achieved by Poe in three stories, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Mystery of Marie Roget, and The Purloined Letter.

WELCOME one and all to our new blog, Poe's Deadly Daughters. We thought it only fitting to launch our blog on Poe's birthday, so please join us in a salute to the master! And please stick around to discuss all things mysterious with us.

Julia Buckley, Liz Zelvin, Lonnie Cruse, Sandra Parshall, and Sharon Wildwind

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