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The Murder in the Rue Morge - Los Crímenes de la Calle Morgue
Hardcover
8 people want to read
About the author
Edgar Allan Poe
7,203 books28.7k followersThe name Poe brings to mind images of murderers and madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return from the dead. His works have been in print since 1827 and include such literary classics as The Tell-Tale Heart, The Raven, and The Fall of the House of Usher. This versatile writer’s oeuvre includes short stories, poetry, a novel, a textbook, a book of scientific theory, and hundreds of essays and book reviews. He is widely acknowledged as the inventor of the modern detective story and an innovator in the science fiction genre, but he made his living as America’s first great literary critic and theoretician. Poe’s reputation today rests primarily on his tales of terror as well as on his haunting lyric poetry.
Just as the bizarre characters in Poe’s stories have captured the public imagination so too has Poe himself. He is seen as a morbid, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows of moonlit cemeteries or crumbling castles. This is the Poe of legend. But much of what we know about Poe is wrong, the product of a biography written by one of his enemies in an attempt to defame the author’s name.
The real Poe was born to traveling actors in Boston on January 19, 1809. Edgar was the second of three children. His other brother William Henry Leonard Poe would also become a poet before his early death, and Poe’s sister Rosalie Poe would grow up to teach penmanship at a Richmond girls’ school. Within three years of Poe’s birth both of his parents had died, and he was taken in by the wealthy tobacco merchant John Allan and his wife Frances Valentine Allan in Richmond, Virginia while Poe’s siblings went to live with other families. Mr. Allan would rear Poe to be a businessman and a Virginia gentleman, but Poe had dreams of being a writer in emulation of his childhood hero the British poet Lord Byron. Early poetic verses found written in a young Poe’s handwriting on the backs of Allan’s ledger sheets reveal how little interest Poe had in the tobacco business.
For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_al...
Just as the bizarre characters in Poe’s stories have captured the public imagination so too has Poe himself. He is seen as a morbid, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows of moonlit cemeteries or crumbling castles. This is the Poe of legend. But much of what we know about Poe is wrong, the product of a biography written by one of his enemies in an attempt to defame the author’s name.
The real Poe was born to traveling actors in Boston on January 19, 1809. Edgar was the second of three children. His other brother William Henry Leonard Poe would also become a poet before his early death, and Poe’s sister Rosalie Poe would grow up to teach penmanship at a Richmond girls’ school. Within three years of Poe’s birth both of his parents had died, and he was taken in by the wealthy tobacco merchant John Allan and his wife Frances Valentine Allan in Richmond, Virginia while Poe’s siblings went to live with other families. Mr. Allan would rear Poe to be a businessman and a Virginia gentleman, but Poe had dreams of being a writer in emulation of his childhood hero the British poet Lord Byron. Early poetic verses found written in a young Poe’s handwriting on the backs of Allan’s ledger sheets reveal how little interest Poe had in the tobacco business.
For more information, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_al...
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 7, 2025
After coming across several mentions of this short story, decided it was time to read this for myself. I can see why it’s credited as “the first locked room” mystery (though Agatha perfected it) and as inspiration for Sherlock Holmes’ thinking. On this basis it gets 4*.
Writing style definitely of the age, again providing evidence of the paucity of my French and total lack of Latin. Did wondering if Neufchatelish refers to Neuchatel in French speaking Switzerland.
Pg 186 in French accents, which, although somewhat Neufchatelish, were still sufficiently indicative of a Parisian origin.
Downloaded legally from Gutenberg.org a copy of Volume 1 of a collection of Poe’s works and sent to Kindle.
Writing style definitely of the age, again providing evidence of the paucity of my French and total lack of Latin. Did wondering if Neufchatelish refers to Neuchatel in French speaking Switzerland.
Pg 186 in French accents, which, although somewhat Neufchatelish, were still sufficiently indicative of a Parisian origin.
Downloaded legally from Gutenberg.org a copy of Volume 1 of a collection of Poe’s works and sent to Kindle.
January 27, 2026
The way that the crime was revealed through detailed explanations and analysing the clues was brilliant. The plot twist was amazing and I thoroughly enjoyed trying to figure out who the murderer was, did not see it coming. Poe's language and splitting the structures into six parts was also interestingly clever. Would 100% recommend this to read.
July 30, 2025
no me ha gustado demasiado, el libro se siente como si tuviera una pequeña introducción y luego directamente el final, no hay chicha por así decirlo, quizás sea un clásico y al ser pionero en este género es normal que no esté muy perfilado pero bueno.
October 21, 2025
Lovely writing. Bad ending
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews