Scan barcode
A review by briandice
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe
4.0
Shipwrecks! Cannibalism! Wiley natives!
This is a quintessential ripping yarn, a page turner of the most classic kind - a book that inspired Melville and caused Auden to gush. It's Poe's only novel, and perhaps given his master of the short form it's best that he only gave us one to savor. And that ending! I wish I hadn't read the appendix; the end to the main narrative was so shocking and unexpected, so good.
Yes, yes, there are those long passages about rookeries and longitudinal markings, but don't skim those beauties. Poe writes in such precise language; the reader comes away from each sentence with the impression that the brush strokes couldn't be improved.
I'm reading Poe as a prelude to reading Arno Schmidt's "Bottom's Dream" and I'm very happy that it led me to finally reading something I've always meant to get to.
This is a quintessential ripping yarn, a page turner of the most classic kind - a book that inspired Melville and caused Auden to gush. It's Poe's only novel, and perhaps given his master of the short form it's best that he only gave us one to savor. And that ending! I wish I hadn't read the appendix; the end to the main narrative was so shocking and unexpected, so good.
Yes, yes, there are those long passages about rookeries and longitudinal markings, but don't skim those beauties. Poe writes in such precise language; the reader comes away from each sentence with the impression that the brush strokes couldn't be improved.
I'm reading Poe as a prelude to reading Arno Schmidt's "Bottom's Dream" and I'm very happy that it led me to finally reading something I've always meant to get to.