Thursday, October 23, 2008
The Fall of the House of Atreus
Dupin and the Minister are brothers. The reference to the twin brothers Atreus and Thyestes is evidence of that. This fact adds a degree of probability to Dupin's insight into the Minister's habits of mind. Poe's Prefect of Police is incapable of locating the stolen letter, whereas Dupin is successful. Dupin identifies with the mind of the criminal, which is both poetic and mathematical. And this is the crux of the issue. The Prefect's dependence on mathematical logic and scientific rigor to catch a thief makes him, according to Dupin, guilty of fallacious reasoning. Just because the Minister is a "poet" does not necessarily mean that he is also a "fool." But to act on that assumption is very foolish indeed, as Dupin points out with relish. Poe quotes Chamfort's aphorism that all conventional wisdom is foolishness, as well as Seneca, who states that "Nothing is more hateful to wisdom than excessive cleverness." In other words, Dupin gives voice to Poe's lack of confidence in the ability of science to solve all the problems of man. By applying empirical notions to our study of psychology and ethics we err, "What is true of relation - of form and quantity - is often grossly false in regard to morals."
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3 comments:
I think the reference to Thyestes means that that Dupin now has the lamb (read - letter) and is claiming the throne (for the time being). It is a sort of "to be continued", representing Dupin's understanding, that though he has won the battle, the war is likely to continue.
... It also acknowledges that Dupin considers the Minister to be a worthy opponent by comparing their rivalry to that of Atreus and Thyestes.
Right on all counts. An insightful discussion developing here.
The narrator mentions the Minister having a "brother," suggesting one is the "poet" and the other a matehmaticianas but is not sure which is which...but Dupin insists they are one in the same, and that he knows him (them?) well--so here's another interesting doubling... these characters tend to collapse into each other--again, questioning a compartmentalizing world view..
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