Name: The Oblong Box
SKU: 57512703
Price: 17.62 EUR
Availability: InStock
Author: Edgar Allan Poe
ISBN: 9781717067784

Type

Physical Book

Author

Edgar Allan Poe

Publisher

Createspace

Language

English

Pages

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

22.9x15.2x0.2 cm

Weight

0.05 kg.

ISBN13

9781717067784

Synopsis "The Oblong 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 The Last Supper. 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. However, 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 was made via lifeboat, but Wyatt refuses to part with the box and issues an emotional plea but was denied by Captain Hardy. Wyatt decides he cannot part with the box and returns to the ship, ties himself to it 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 passage was already registered with Wyatt and his wife, so as not to arouse suspicion, a maid posed as the wife.

Edgar Allan Poe

(Author)

View Author's Page

Edgar Allan Poe (Boston, United States, 1809-1849) was a celebrated American writer, considered a master of the short story and a renovator of Gothic narrative. His work, marked by mystery and terror, includes iconic titles such as The Raven (1845), which immortalized him, and innovative poems and stories that influenced genres like detective fiction and science fiction. In addition to his literary output, Poe stood out as a critic and theorist, especially with his essay The Philosophy of Composition (1846). His legacy remains alive and has inspired literature, cinema, music, and art to this day.

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