The History of the Mystery

Edgar Allen Poe was a recognized literary figure in his time, one whose works continue to be reprinted and read. In their Introduction to Detective Fiction: Crime and Compromise (1974), editors Dick Allen and David Chacko speak of detective fiction as the "strange children of Edgar Allen Poe." Poe's first detective story, The Murders in the Rue Morgue appeared in Graham's Ladies's and Gentlemen's Magazine .(April, 1841). According to Elliott Gilbert, in his The World of Mystery Fiction (1990), this tale is considered to be the most influential in the history of detective fiction. It introduces C. Auguste Dupin, amateur detective, who solves a crime that baffles the police. The narrator is a close observer of Dupin's work,but does not understand how Dupin arrives at the solution. After naming the culprit, Dupin explains the science of detection which he calls ratiocination, a mental process.

Dupin next appears in The Mystery of Marie Roget, a much longer story based on the murder of a beautiful woman in New York. One factor adding to the demand for crime fiction was the press as shown in a book review published in the New York Times (October 24, 2006): David Stashower's ,The Beautiful Cigar Girl . The book tells how the case of Mary Rogers, a young saleswoman murdered in the summer of 1841 in Manhattan baffled New York. Murder, as Stashower writes, casts a peculiar spell, a mixture of horror, fascination, and relief. One more member of the herd has been picked off, but it was somebody else who attracted the invisible, anonymous hand that could strike anyone at any time. When the victim is a beautiful woman, sex enters the equation, and you have front page news.. Intrigued by this sensational death of a stunningly beautiful young woman, Poe assigned his fictional detective, C. Auguste Dupin, to solve the crime and thus wrote his second tale of detection. The third of the Dupin tales is The Purloined Letter . Two other Poe stories are mysteries, but do not feature Dupin: Thou Art the Man and The Gold Bug .

These five stories contain the important elements of the mystery story. In his introduction to The World of Mystery Fiction (1990), Gilbert quotes from Robert Lowndes' article, The Contributions of Edgar Allen Poe . Lowndes found 44 of the literary devices often used in mystery stories could be traced to Poe, including: the brilliant, if eccentric private detective with a genius for applying pure inductive and deductive reasoning to human behavior, a baffling crime, a locked room, the friend to whom the detective tells the facts, the names of innocent suspects, the detective's observations of the crime scene, the battle of wits with the official police,the end where the detective reveals in a satisfying manner how he solved the case, the police asking the detective for help and the detective solving the case from his armchair by reading newspaper accounts and official data. The detective also personally wants to settle with the culprit. From the last two non-Dupin stories, Lowndes finds Poe's use of the least likely suspect and the cryptogram. Poe was fascinated by puzzles, and how the human mind solves them through reason and logic.

Gilbert refers to another critic, J.R. Christopher, who wrote in Poe and the Tradition of the Detective Story that Poe contributed additional plot elements: the idea of psychological detection, the obvious place where the missing item is hidden, the plan to divert the criminal.

Poe found some of these elements in the many stories of crimes reported in his time. He certainly read widely, was himself recognized as a literary figure of note. His genius lay in bringing them together into a coherent, interesting, and challenging tale. Like Dickens, he understood how to interest readers and he was a good enough writer to find his place in literature. Today, Poe's works continue to be available for purchase, and there are many Poe devotees. Mystery writers often refer to the creator of their craft. The novel Entombed by Linda Fairstein,(2005) is set in 19th century Greenwich Village, the brownstone where Poe once lived. The skeleton of a young woman buried standing upright behind a brick wall is unearthed. The trail of clues leads to the Bronx Botanical Gardens. A group of Poe devotees shed light on a stone cold, modern day murder of Gothic proportions.

Novels telling of crime and featuring detectives were published in the period after Poe. But the authors seem to question the possible success of detectives. Dickens featured Inspector Buckett in Bleak House(1853), but the detective is leading the criminal away when the culprit turns on him saying Can you bring him back to life? Buckett has to admit that murder cannot be undone. The situation cannot be remedied. Wilkie Collins in his novel The Moonstone (1863) is much admired, but his detective has to admit he failed in his interpretations of the data. Such a novel seems to be saying that the human ability to solve difficult puzzles is limited. It would be some five decades before another author would create a character with the brain power to solve even the most difficult puzzling crimes and the practical ability to carry out what he had to do.

Arthur Conan Doyle, a young doctor was looking for a way to earn more money. He determined to write a detective story. He later acknowledged the models for his detective, pointing out Dupin and Lecoq, particularly. The tales of the most famous detective in literature, Sherlock Holmes, are told by the good doctor Watson. In the first story he begins by explaining that he was in bad shape after serving in the military in Afghanistan. Short of funds, he was searching for housing when an acquaintance told him of a curious man who wanted to share lodgings. Watson's meeting with this unusual man is classic, for Sherlock Holmes' famous words to the doctor: I see you have been in Afghanistan. Dr. Watson tells us he was astounded, how was this known? Sherlock explained what he said was a simple deduction. Doyle employs Poe's literary device, the admiring friend who tells about the work of the brilliant Dupin. The author has turned away from the less successful detectives of Dickens and Collins.