The Purloined Letter

I thought the story “The Purloined Letter” by Edgar Allan Poe was an interesting story but I'm not sure if I enjoyed it or not. The plot kept my attention but I think the way it was written made it difficult for me to really get into it. I thought it was also interesting because it was not exactly like many other stories that Poe has written. This story was a detective story but one with a fault. I constantly got the feeling that this man Dupin knew more than G.

The story is about a robbery of a letter that is being investigated by "G", who is the Prefect of Police in Paris. G then goes on to describe not only how the letter was stolen but also how they have investigated the theft so far. The Minister, who is the culprit, stole the letter out in the open but because of a third party the owner of the letter could not stop him. The police then spent the next week searching high and low in the Minister’s hotel room every night while he was absent. As he describes the search you get the feeling that even though it seemed incredibly thorough, G and his police force had to have overlooked something. Then after several weeks G, Dupin and a third man all have another meeting about this letter. G has still not found the letter even though he searched through the Minister's quarters yet again. Dupin on the other hand knows exactly where the letter had been. He somewhat cons G into promising money to whoever finds the letter and the produces it from a concealed spot. Dupin then goes on to explain to the third man or narrator that the reason he found the letter was because he put himself in the Minister's shoes. He thought about it reasonably and the answer was rather simple instead of intricate.

This story has a moral because in the end the reader realize that some things are not as complicated as we think they are. Sometimes the answer is right in front of your face. So even though the basis of this story and the actual story were exciting and fun to read about, the language was still harder to get into because of the constant description of every tiny detail.