| "The Oblong Box" | |
|---|---|
| Short story by Edgar Allan Poe | |
 | |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Horror Short story |
| Publication | |
| Published in | The Dollar Newspaper |
| Publisher | Reprinted in Godey's Magazine and Lady's Book |
| Media type | Newspaper |
| Publication date | August 28, 1844 |
"The Oblong Box" is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1844, about a sea voyage and a mysterious box.
The story opens with the unnamed narrator recounting a summer sea voyage from Charleston, South Carolina, to New York City aboard the ship Independence. The narrator learns that his old college friend Cornelius Wyatt is aboard with his wife and two sisters, though he has reserved three state-rooms. After conjecturing the extra room was for a servant or extra baggage, he learns his friend has brought on board an oblong pine box: "It was about six feet in length by two and a half in breadth." The narrator notes its peculiar shape and especially an odd odor coming from it. Even so, he presumes his friend has acquired an especially valuable copy of Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper . The narrator has never met Wyatt's wife but heard she is a woman of "surpassing beauty, wit, and accomplishment".
The box, the narrator is surprised to learn, shares the state-room with Wyatt and his wife, while the second room is shared by the two sisters. For several nights, the narrator witnesses his friend's surprisingly unattractive wife leaving the state-room every night around 11 o'clock and going into the third state-room before returning first thing in the morning. While she is gone, the narrator believes he hears his friend opening the box and sobbing, which he attributes to "artistic enthusiasm".
As the Independence passes Cape Hatteras it is caught in a terrible hurricane. Escape from the damaged ship is made via lifeboat, but Wyatt refuses to part with the box. He issues an emotional plea to Captain Hardy but is denied. Wyatt returns to the ship, and ties himself to the box with a rope. "In another instant both body and box were in the sea—disappearing suddenly, at once and forever."
About a month after the incident, the narrator happens to meet the captain. Hardy explains that the box had, in fact, held the corpse of Wyatt's recently deceased young wife. He had intended to return the body to her mother but bringing a corpse on board would have caused panic among the passengers. Captain Hardy had arranged, then, to register the box merely as baggage. As both Wyatt and his wife were already registered as passengers, a maid posed as the wife so as not to arouse suspicion.
In writing "The Oblong Box", Poe recalled his experience while stationed as a soldier at Fort Moultrie many years earlier by setting the ship's embarking point as Charleston, South Carolina to New York. [1] The Charleston area is also referenced in Poe's stories "The Gold-Bug" and "The Balloon-Hoax". [2] Just a few months before the publication of "The Oblong Box", Poe experienced his own sea voyage when he moved to New York via steamboat. His wife, Virginia, had begun showing signs of her illness about two years before in 1842. [3] "The Oblong Box" was in part based on the murder of Samuel Adams by John C. Colt, brother of Sam Colt, a story which dominated the New York press at the time; [4] [5] [6] John C. Colt disposed of Adams' body by putting it in a crate and filling it with salt. [7] The name of the character Wyatt was likely derived from Professor Thomas Wyatt, an author whose work Poe translated in The Conchologist's First Book . [8]
Poe originally offered "The Oblong Box" to Nathaniel Parker Willis for the New Mirror, but Willis suggested it was better suited for the Opal , a gift book edited by Sarah Josepha Hale. [9] It was first published on August 28, 1844, in the Dollar Newspaper in Philadelphia. [10] It was also published in the September 1844 issue of Godey's Magazine and Lady's Book , [10] also edited by Hale. [9] The story was also reprinted in The Broadway Journal, in the Saturday, December 13, 1845, edition. [11]
Poe biographer James Hutchisson equates "The Oblong Box" with Poe's series of "tales of ratiocination" or detective fiction stories, a series which includes "The Murders in the Rue Morgue". [12] Scott Peeples compares "The Oblong Box" to this genre as well but notes that it is not strictly a detective story because it did not emphasize the character of the detective and his method. [13] He also notes that the protagonist is "bumbling" because he allows his personal opinions to taint the physical evidence, leading him to incorrect conclusions. [13] In On Poe, scholar J. Gerald Kennedy saw the story as a satire. He wrote, "Though not a major work in the Poe canon, 'The Oblong Box' delivers, through the narrator's grotesque misinterpretations, a clever satiric version of the detective hero." [14]
NBC Short Story aired a dramatic reading of "The Oblong Box" in the 1950s. It is available at archive.org. [15]
A 1969 film directed by Gordon Hessler starring Vincent Price carries the name The Oblong Box . [16] It is a loose adaptation of Poe's story. [17]
The CBS Radio Mystery Theater , which ran from January 1974 to December 1982, did an adaptation of "The Oblong Box" which aired on January 8, 1975. It is available at archive.org. [18]
"The Black Cat" is a short story by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe. It was first published in the August 19, 1843, edition of The Saturday Evening Post. In the story, an unnamed narrator has a strong affection for pets until he perversely turns to abusing them. His favorite, a pet black cat, bites him one night and the narrator punishes it by cutting its eye out and then hanging it from a tree. The home burns down but one remaining wall shows a burned outline of a cat hanging from a noose. He soon finds another black cat, similar to the first except for a white mark on its chest, but he develops a hatred for it as well. He attempts to kill the cat with an axe but his wife stops him; instead, the narrator murders his wife. He conceals the body behind a brick wall in his basement. The police soon come and, after the narrator's tapping on the wall is met with a shrieking sound, they find not only the wife's corpse but also the black cat that had been accidentally walled in with the body and alerted them with its cry.
"The Raven" is a narrative poem by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. First published in January 1845, the poem is often noted for its musicality, stylized language and supernatural atmosphere. It tells of a distraught lover who is paid a visit by a mysterious raven that repeatedly speaks a single word. The lover, often identified as a student, is lamenting the loss of his love, Lenore. Sitting on a bust of Pallas, the raven seems to further antagonize the protagonist with its repetition of the word "Nevermore". The poem makes use of folk, mythological, religious, and classical references.
"A Descent into the Maelström" is an 1841 short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. In the tale, a man recounts how he survived a shipwreck and a whirlpool. It has been grouped with Poe's tales of ratiocination and also labeled an early form of science fiction.
"The Murders in the Rue Morgue" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe published in Graham's Magazine in 1841. It has been described as the first modern detective story; Poe referred to it as one of his "tales of ratiocination".
"Annabel Lee" is the last complete poem composed by American author Edgar Allan Poe. Like many of Poe's poems, it explores the theme of the death of a beautiful woman. The narrator, who fell in love with Annabel Lee when they were young, has a love for her so strong that even angels are envious. He retains his love for her after her death. There has been debate over who, if anyone, was the inspiration for "Annabel Lee". Though many women have been suggested, Poe's wife Virginia Eliza Clemm Poe is one of the more credible candidates. Written in 1849, it was not published until shortly after Poe's death that same year.
"The Gold-Bug" is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe published in 1843. The plot follows William Legrand, who becomes fixated on an unusual gold-colored bug he has discovered. His servant Jupiter fears that Legrand is going insane and goes to Legrand's friend, an unnamed narrator, who agrees to visit his old friend. Legrand pulls the other two into an adventure after deciphering a secret message that will lead to a buried treasure.
"The Fall of the House of Usher" is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1839 in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, then included in the collection Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque in 1840. The short story, a work of Gothic fiction, includes themes of madness, family, isolation, and metaphysical identities.
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, written in 1838, is the only complete novel by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaler called the Grampus. Various adventures and misadventures befall Pym, including shipwreck, mutiny, and cannibalism, before he is saved by the crew of the Jane Guy. Aboard this vessel, Pym and a sailor named Dirk Peters continue their adventures farther south. Docking on land, they encounter hostile, black-skinned natives before escaping back to the ocean. The novel ends abruptly as Pym and Peters continue toward the South Pole.
Le ChevalierC. Auguste Dupin is a fictional character created by Edgar Allan Poe. Dupin made his first appearance in Poe's 1841 short story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", widely considered the first detective fiction story. He reappears in "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt" (1842) and "The Purloined Letter" (1844).
"The Oval Portrait" is a horror short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe, involving the disturbing circumstances of a portrait in a château. It is one of his shortest stories, filling only two pages in its initial publication in 1842.
"The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" is a short story by the American author Edgar Allan Poe about a mesmerist who puts a man in a suspended hypnotic state at the moment of death. An example of a tale of suspense and horror, it is also to a certain degree a hoax, as it was published without claiming to be fictional, and many at the time of publication (1845) took it to be a factual account. Poe admitted it to be a work of pure fiction in letters to his correspondents.
"Ligeia" is an early short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1838. The story follows an unnamed narrator and his wife Ligeia, a beautiful and intelligent raven-haired woman. She falls ill, composes "The Conqueror Worm", and quotes lines attributed to Joseph Glanvill shortly before dying.
"MS. Found in a Bottle" is an 1833 short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The plot follows an unnamed narrator at sea who finds himself in a series of harrowing circumstances. As he nears his own disastrous death while his ship drives ever southward, he writes an "MS.", or manuscript, telling of his adventures which he casts into the sea. Some critics believe the story was meant as a satire of typical sea tales.
"Metzengerstein: A Tale in Imitation of the German" is a short story by American writer and poet Edgar Allan Poe, his first to see print. It was first published in the pages of Philadelphia's Saturday Courier magazine, in 1832. The story follows the young Frederick, the last of the Metzengerstein family, who carries on a long-standing feud with the Berlifitzing family. Suspected of causing a fire that kills the Berlifitzing family patriarch, Frederick becomes intrigued with a previously unnoticed and untamed horse. Metzengerstein is punished for his cruelty when his own home catches fire and the horse carries him into the flame. Part of a Latin hexameter by Martin Luther serves as the story's epigraph: Pestis eram vivus—moriens tua mors ero.
"The Man of the Crowd" is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe about a nameless narrator following a man through a crowded London. It was first published in 1840.
"The Imp of the Perverse" is a short story by 19th-century American author and critic Edgar Allan Poe. Beginning as an essay, it discusses the narrator's self-destructive impulses, embodied as the symbolic metaphor of The Imp of the Perverse. The narrator describes this spirit as the agent that tempts a person to do things "merely because we feel we should not."
Tamerlane and Other Poems is the first published work by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The short collection of poems was first published in 1827. Today, it is believed only 12 copies of the collection still exist.
"Thou Art the Man", originally titled "Thou Art the Man!", is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1844. It is an early experiment in detective fiction, like Poe's "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", though it is generally considered an inferior story.
Mary Cecilia Rogers was an American murder victim whose story became a national sensation.
John Caldwell Colt, the brother of Samuel Colt, was an American fur trader, bookkeeper, and law clerk. He served briefly as a U.S. Marine, forging a letter to get himself discharged after three months. After numerous business ventures, he became an authority concerning double-entry bookkeeping and published a textbook concerning the subject, which had 45 editions and remained in continuous publication until 13 years after his death.
The Oblong Box" (not a story of crime as Poe told it) is based in part on the murder of the printer Samuel Adams by John C. Colt— which succeeded the death of Mary Rogers as the leading sensational topic for the American press
The Oblong Box public domain audiobook at LibriVox