Dupin's Logic by Jackson Keller

As the first detective murder mystery, Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “The Murder’s in the Rue Morgue” establishes a lot of the conventions and tropes of the genre as a whole. Poe gives us the genius recluse, as well as his intelligent, but ultimately normal, companion and narrator, the ineffective police, and the final reveal of the mystery (Ahem, Doyle you copycat, you). Suspension of disbelief plays a necessary role in these works of fiction. The genius-murder-mystery-solvers pull off a lot of mental feats that most people probably can’t. These feats are part of what makes the stories entertaining; they’re exciting and incredible, but at the same time no so unrealistic as to baffle the audience. SPOILER ALERT: in “Rue Morgue”, an orangutan committed the murder (Do you really need spoiler alerts for stories published in 1841? At what point can I just say whatever I want? What’s the etiquette on that, huh?). While the orangutan murderer is pretty out there in terms of later stories in the genre, Dupin’s (that’s our genius in this one: C. Auguste Dupin) method of solving the crime allows for continued suspension of disbelief. Dupin uses his logic and reasoning to discover how the murderer must have escaped, and what physical capabilities the murderer needed to pull off the crime, analyzing the bodies at the crime scene and their brutal injuries, the noises heard by first responders, and a little tuft of orange hair found in one of the victim’s hands. He deduces that only an orangutan could have pulled off the crime. Pretty far out… but maybe someone could do it with all the evidence Dupin gathers with his skills of observation.

Everything’s fine and dandy, right? NO EVERYTHING IS NOT. I’d like to address a specific trope in the genre that should challenge reader’s suspension of disbelief: mind-reading. Let’s look at a passage from the story:

We were strolling one night down a long dirty street, in the vicinity of the Palais Royal. Being both, apparently, occupied with thought, neither of us had s