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Whist, Draughts, and Chess

During his explanation of what true analytical thought requires, the narrator evokes popular parlor games. These games represent different approaches to problem solving. We can also extend the metaphor to read chess as the Parisian police and draughts and whist as Dupin. Chess has prestige and fame as a game of intelligence for intelligent people, but according to the story, it is superficially a smart game. Chess, on the other hand, for all its show is more about memorization and concentration. Similarly, the police should in theory be better at solving murders than Dupin because it is ostensibly their job to do so, but they are confused by the case because of its unique particulars. Draughts (checkers) and whist are parlor games that the narrator believes have hidden depth because to win one must be able to adapt its simple moves to fit unique situations and opponents. Accordingly, Dupin may be an eccentric amateur, but his analytical acumen makes him better at solving an unusual crime.

The Orangutan

The orangutan is primarily symbolic of pure irrationality, which is the complete opposite of Dupin’s astute logic. The orangutan has no method or motive, and his actions stem from mere instinct. He attempts to mimic human behavior by trying to shave Madame L’Espanaye as he sees the sailor do, but he lacks the ability to understand the purpose of the action. When he tragically slits Madame L’Espanaye’s throat, he panics, reacting to the blood as a threat. He is unable to understand the logical cause and effect between his actions and the blood. He then attacks Mademoiselle Camille out of fear, not out of any particular malice or hatred toward her. Although an unusual criminal, the orangutan is a perfect avatar of the role of crime in a detective story: the chaotic force that disrupts the order of society, which the detective must bring to rights. Against this random and impulsive behavior, Dupin’s methodical, rational, and calm logic stands out all the more.

An alternate reading of the orangutan is as the ultimate foreign other. One of the primary 19th century American and European anxieties surrounding urban crime was a xenophobic fear of the dangerous outsider or foreigner. In this era of empire and manifest destiny, one of the ways in which the conquest of Africa, Asia, and the rest of the American continent was justified was by the myth that people who lived in these places were uncivilized, which in turn couched colonialism as heroically bringing civilization to the “savage.” The idea that people from these countries were uncivilized also implied that they were violent and dangerous. More sinisterly, colonial and white supremacist language, including the language of Poe’s time period, often used monkeys, apes, and orangutans to describe people of color. Thus, the orangutan brought from Borneo represents the specter of a foreign threat that cannot be reasoned with and metes out violence senselessly. Through this lens, the sailor placing the orangutan in the zoo is a way of civilizing, taming, and controlling the violent foreign outsider.

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