Edgar Allan Poe "The Purloined Letter"

Although Poe is mostly a horror writer this story was a detective one. It was narrated by a nameless character, and depicted a story about a letter that was stolen out of a woman’s room that was of extremely high importance, and could possibly service as political blackmail. This matter is to be kept discreet, and to be handled as quickly as possible as the contents of the letter are of such importance. Poe referred to this story as “tale of ratiocination” which employed reason, not horror. This was not a detective story where the reader was given clues to solve the mystery; rather it took you along for the search of the letter. It showed the various investigative tools that they used to attempt to find it, through science and investigation. As the story goes on, and they are unsuccessful at recovering the letter, they look at different ways to try to outsmart the thief. At the end Dupin finds the letter, and replaces the original with a note that says “Nothing is more hateful to wisdom than excessive cleverness.”