“The Mystery of Marie Rogêt”: Holdback Evidence and the Copycat Effect
Michael Arntfield · Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks · 2016
Although the official subtitle for the first printing of Poe’s 1842 short story “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt” was, fittingly, “A Sequel to the Murders in the Rue Morgue,” beyond the reprise of the Parisian setting and the return of Dupin as protagonist, the two stories have little to nothing in common. In retrospect, as with many sequels, the subtitling was likely little more than a shrewd branding scheme to align a discrete artistic property with the acclaim of a preceding text that bears little resemblance to its successor. Often considered the least popular and critically successful of the Dupin mysteries or any of Poe’s narratives showcasing ratiocination, the forensic legacy of “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt” is thus less obvious than some of Poe’s other works that are more transparently procedural in scope and which underscore the theoretical and methodological value of FS 2 . Yet, it is in this same procedural ambiguity—the point at which literary criticism, criminology, and investigative efficacy converge—where the trained eye conversant in police tactics sees the narrative’s enduring value as a forensic parable. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.