Undecidable Boundary Between Science And Poetry

Edgar Allan Poe (1809—1849) is a special writer in American literature duringthe early19thcentury. In his short lifetime, his writing of short stories, poems andliterary criticism won him a minor reputation. Not until the late19thcentury whenCharles Pierre Baudelaire introduced him into Europe did he enter the canon.Therefore he is recognized as the predecessor of Symbolism and has influence onModernism. Poe’s short stories embrace a variety of genres including Gothic fiction,horror fiction and science fiction. He is also regarded as the founder of the detectivefiction. His trilogy，“Murders in the Rue Morgue”,“The Mystery of Marie Roget”and “The Purloined Letter”，which are featured by Dupin, the detective, set theclassic patterns for later detective fictions.The detective stories by Poe are based on meticulous scientific ratiocination onone hand, and exert a special poetic effect on readers on the other hand. Therefore,the opposition between scientificity and poetics and their combination has long beenthe focal point for debate over these stories.With the theories of Structuralism and Deconstruction, and with Edgar AllanPoe’s idea of poetics, this thesis intends to analyze the scientific and poetic elementsin “Murders in the Rue Morgue”,“The Mystery of Marie Roget” and “The PurloinedLetter”. In so doing, it concludes that the boundary between scientificity and poeticsis undecidable in these detective stories, and that Poe’s writing of detective storiesconforms to his own theory of poetics.The thesis consists of three main parts. The introduction provides informationabout Poe’s literary achievement and the studies of Poe’s detective stories. The mainbody consists of three chapters. Chapter one analyzes the scientificity and itsformation in “Murders in the Rue Morgue”, pointing out that the validity of Dupin’sdetection derives from his scientific construction of the narrative of the murder caseand his objectivity. Chapter two firstly investigates Dupin’s detective method that is similar to deconstructive close reading in “The Mystery of Marie Roget”, andLacan’s reading of “The Purloined Letter, pointing out the failure of scientificity inthese two stories. Secondly, by studying Dupin carefully, this chapter furtheranalyzes how he becomes less objective. Chapter three shifts focus from thescientific to poetics, with the application of Roman Jakobson’s theory of metonymyand metaphor, inquires the poetic method of detection and how Poe’s detectivestories achieve poetic effect. Finally, by juxtaposing Poe’s theory of poetics and hisdetective stories, this chapter unveils heir interconnection. The conclusion isarrived at that the poetic effect of the detective stories of Poe, as a new literary genre,comes from the undecidability of the boundary between the scientificity and poeticsin them.