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A review by mshield
The Mystery of Marie Rogêt by Edgar Allan Poe
2.0
1.5 rounded up.
Murders in the Rue Morgue (to which this is a sequel) was an investigative, speculative, and conclusive detective piece, which I was happy to have read.
The Mystery of Marie Rogêt is a speculative and, off-screen only, conclusive short story that drags through its own meandering, repetitive, and drab verbosity.
Our proto-Holmes amateur (though with deductive reasoning/ probability ascertaining skills far surpassing the authorities') detective conducts his investigation into the mysterious disappearance and death of Marie Rogêt entirely through newspaper articles. He systematically tears them apart and builds the story anew. Poe scores a point here, but fails to collect any more with just how tedious he makes it. It is a lengthy essay on probability and reasoning.
The extra half point stems not just from the originality but also as this doubles as Poe's own speculative deduction into the real life death/murder of a woman (Mary Rogers) in New York. The essential facts are the same, while the non-essential are subject to creative liberty.
There's some interesting (far from unique but amazingly (frighteningly?) still relevant some 180-years later) criticisms lobbied at tabloids/newspapers thrown in.
Ultimately, it was a predominantly boring and unsatisfactory story; a disappointing sequel to the Murders at the Rue Morgue.
Murders in the Rue Morgue (to which this is a sequel) was an investigative, speculative, and conclusive detective piece, which I was happy to have read.
The Mystery of Marie Rogêt is a speculative and, off-screen only, conclusive short story that drags through its own meandering, repetitive, and drab verbosity.
Our proto-Holmes amateur (though with deductive reasoning/ probability ascertaining skills far surpassing the authorities') detective conducts his investigation into the mysterious disappearance and death of Marie Rogêt entirely through newspaper articles. He systematically tears them apart and builds the story anew. Poe scores a point here, but fails to collect any more with just how tedious he makes it. It is a lengthy essay on probability and reasoning.
The extra half point stems not just from the originality but also as this doubles as Poe's own speculative deduction into the real life death/murder of a woman (Mary Rogers) in New York. The essential facts are the same, while the non-essential are subject to creative liberty.
There's some interesting (far from unique but amazingly (frighteningly?) still relevant some 180-years later) criticisms lobbied at tabloids/newspapers thrown in.
Ultimately, it was a predominantly boring and unsatisfactory story; a disappointing sequel to the Murders at the Rue Morgue.