The Narrative Of Arthur Gordon Pym Of Nantucket and Related Tales — Edgar Allan Poe

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym is an archetypal American story of escape from home and family which traces a young mans rite of passage through a series of terrible brushes with death during a fateful sea voyage But it also goes much deeper as Pym encounters various interpretative dilemmas at last leaving the reader with a broken off ending that defies solution Apart from its violence and mystery the tale calls attention to the act of writing and to the problem of representing truth Layer upon layer of elaborate hoaxes include its authors own role of posing as ghost writer of the narrative Pym his only novel has become the key text for our understanding of Poe This edition offers eight short tales which are linked to Pym by their treatment of persistent themes fantastic voyages gigantic whirlpools and premature burials or by their ironic commentary on Poes mystification of his readers

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym is an archetypal American story of escape from home and family which traces a young man s rite of passage through a series of terrible brushes with death during a fateful sea voyage But it also goes much deeper as Pym encounters various interpretative dilemmas at last leaving the reader with a broken off ending that defies solution Apart from its violence and mystery the tale calls attention to the act of writing and to the problem of representing truth Layer upon layer of elaborate hoaxes include its author s own role of posing as ghost writer of the narrative Pym his only novel has become the key text for our understanding of Poe This edition offers eight short tales which are linked to Pym by their treatment of persistent themes fantastic voyages gigantic whirlpools and premature burials or by their ironic commentary on Poe s mystification of his readers