A Descent into the Maelstrom
Encyclopedia
"A Descent into the Maelström" is a short story
by Edgar Allan Poe
. In the tale, a man recounts how he survived a shipwreck and a whirlpool
. It has been grouped with Poe's tales of ratiocination and also labeled an early form of science fiction
.
, it is couched as a story within a story
, a tale told at the summit of a mountain climb in Lofoten
, Norway
. The story is told by an old man who reveals that he only appears old—"You suppose me a very old man," he says, "but I am not. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves." The narrator, convinced by the power of the whirlpool
s he sees in the ocean beyond, is then told of the "old" man's fishing trip with his two brothers a few years ago.
Driven by "the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens", their ship was caught in the vortex
. One brother was pulled into the waves; the other was driven mad by the horror of the spectacle, and drowned as the ship was pulled under. At first the narrator only saw hideous terror in the spectacle. In a moment of revelation, he saw that the Maelström is a beautiful and awesome creation. Observing how objects around him were pulled into it, he deduced that "the larger the bodies, the more rapid their descent" and that spherical-shaped objects were pulled in the fastest. Unlike his brother, he abandoned ship and held on to a cylindrical barrel until he was saved several hours later. The old man tells the story to the narrator without any hope that the narrator will believe it.
's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
(1798): in both, an excited old man tells his story of shipwreck and survival. The tale is one of sensation, emphasizing the narrator's thoughts and feelings, especially his terror of being killed in the whirlpool. The narrator uses his reasoning skills to survive and the story is considered one of Poe's early examples of science fiction
.
, a man from Norway who wrote about a famous maelström at Saltstraumen
. The opening epigraph is quoted from an essay by Joseph Glanvill
called "Against Confidence in Philosophy and Matters of Speculation" (1676), though Poe altered the wording significantly.
, published in April. Poe rushed to complete the story in time and later admitted that the conclusion was imperfect. Shortly after Poe's story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue
" was translated into French without acknowledgment, French readers were seeking out other Poe works and "A Descent into the Maelström" was amongst the earliest translated. Like his other sea adventure works The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
and The Journal of Julius Rodman
, "A Descent into the Maelström" was believed by readers to be true and one passage was reprinted in the ninth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica
– ironically, it was based on a passage that Poe had lifted from an earlier edition of that same encyclopedia. In June 1845, "A Descent into the Maelström" was collected for the first time as part of Poe's Tales, published by G. P. Putnam's SonsFile:Graham's May 1841 descent.jpg Wiley & Putnam, and also included eleven of his other stories.
composer
Philip Glass
wrote music inspired by "A Descent into the Maelström". It was commissioned by the Australian Dance Theatre.
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
by Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
. In the tale, a man recounts how he survived a shipwreck and a whirlpool
Whirlpool
A whirlpool is a swirling body of water usually produced by ocean tides. The vast majority of whirlpools are not very powerful. More powerful ones are more properly termed maelstroms. Vortex is the proper term for any whirlpool that has a downdraft...
. It has been grouped with Poe's tales of ratiocination and also labeled an early form of science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
.
Plot
Inspired by the MoskstraumenMoskstraumen
The Moskenstraumen or Moskstraumen is a system of tidal eddies and whirlpools, one of the strongest in the world, that forms at the Lofoten archipelago, Norway, in the Norwegian Sea. It is located between the...
, it is couched as a story within a story
Story within a story
A story within a story, also rendered story-within-a-story, is a literary device in which one narrative is presented during the action of another narrative. Mise en abyme is the French term for a similar literary device...
, a tale told at the summit of a mountain climb in Lofoten
Lofoten
Lofoten is an archipelago and a traditional district in the county of Nordland, Norway. Though lying within the Arctic Circle, the archipelago experiences one of the world's largest elevated temperature anomalies relative to its high latitude.-Etymology:...
, Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
. The story is told by an old man who reveals that he only appears old—"You suppose me a very old man," he says, "but I am not. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves." The narrator, convinced by the power of the whirlpool
Whirlpool
A whirlpool is a swirling body of water usually produced by ocean tides. The vast majority of whirlpools are not very powerful. More powerful ones are more properly termed maelstroms. Vortex is the proper term for any whirlpool that has a downdraft...
s he sees in the ocean beyond, is then told of the "old" man's fishing trip with his two brothers a few years ago.
Driven by "the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens", their ship was caught in the vortex
Vortex
A vortex is a spinning, often turbulent,flow of fluid. Any spiral motion with closed streamlines is vortex flow. The motion of the fluid swirling rapidly around a center is called a vortex...
. One brother was pulled into the waves; the other was driven mad by the horror of the spectacle, and drowned as the ship was pulled under. At first the narrator only saw hideous terror in the spectacle. In a moment of revelation, he saw that the Maelström is a beautiful and awesome creation. Observing how objects around him were pulled into it, he deduced that "the larger the bodies, the more rapid their descent" and that spherical-shaped objects were pulled in the fastest. Unlike his brother, he abandoned ship and held on to a cylindrical barrel until he was saved several hours later. The old man tells the story to the narrator without any hope that the narrator will believe it.
Analysis
The story's opening bears a similarity to Samuel Taylor ColeridgeSamuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is the longest major poem by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, written in 1797–98 and was published in 1798 in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads. Modern editions use a later revised version printed in 1817 that featured a gloss...
(1798): in both, an excited old man tells his story of shipwreck and survival. The tale is one of sensation, emphasizing the narrator's thoughts and feelings, especially his terror of being killed in the whirlpool. The narrator uses his reasoning skills to survive and the story is considered one of Poe's early examples of science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
.
Major themes
- Ratiocination (see also "The Mystery of Marie RogetThe Mystery of Marie Roget"The Mystery of Marie Rogêt", often subtitled A Sequel to "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe written in 1842. This is the first murder mystery based on the details of a real crime. It first appeared in Snowden's Ladies' Companion in three installments, November and...
", "The Purloined LetterThe Purloined Letter"The Purloined Letter" is a short story by American author Edgar Allan Poe. It is the third of his three detective stories featuring the fictional C. Auguste Dupin, the other two being "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" and "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt". These stories are considered to be important...
", C. Auguste Dupin) - Sea tale (see also The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of NantucketThe Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of NantucketThe Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket is the only complete novel written by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaling ship called the Grampus...
, "MS. Found in a BottleMS. Found in a Bottle"MS. Found in a Bottle" is an 1833 short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The plot follows an unnamed narrator at sea who finds himself in a series of harrowing circumstances. As he nears his own disastrous death while his ship drives ever southward, he writes an "MS.", or manuscript...
", "The Oblong BoxThe Oblong Box (short story)"The Oblong Box" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1844, about a sea voyage and a mysterious box.-Plot summary:The story opens with the unnamed narrator recounting a summer sea voyage from Charleston, South Carolina to New York City aboard the ship Independence...
") - Story within a storyStory within a storyA story within a story, also rendered story-within-a-story, is a literary device in which one narrative is presented during the action of another narrative. Mise en abyme is the French term for a similar literary device...
(see also "The Oval PortraitThe Oval Portrait"The Oval Portrait" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe involving the disturbing circumstances surrounding a portrait in a chateau. It is one of his shortest stories, filling only two pages in its initial publication in 1842.-Plot summary:...
")
Allusions
The story mentions Jonas Danilssønn RamusJonas Danilssønn Ramus
Jonas Danilssønn Ramus was a Norwegian priest and historian. He was principally an author of religious and historical writings. -Background:...
, a man from Norway who wrote about a famous maelström at Saltstraumen
Saltstraumen
Saltstraumen is a sound with a strong tidal current located in Nordland 30 km east of the city of Bodø, Norway. The narrow channel connects the outer Saltfjord with its extension, the large Skjerstadfjord. It is the strongest tidal current in the world...
. The opening epigraph is quoted from an essay by Joseph Glanvill
Joseph Glanvill
Joseph Glanvill was an English writer, philosopher, and clergyman. Not himself a scientist, he has been called "the most skillful apologist of the virtuosi", or in other words the leading propagandist for the approach of the English natural philosophers of the later 17th century.-Life:He was...
called "Against Confidence in Philosophy and Matters of Speculation" (1676), though Poe altered the wording significantly.
Publication history
The story first appeared in the May 1841 edition of Graham's MagazineGraham's Magazine
Graham's Magazine was a nineteenth century periodical based in Philadelphia established by George Rex Graham. It was alternatively referred to as Graham's Lady's and Gentleman's Magazine , Graham's Magazine of Literature and Art , Graham's American Monthly Magazine of Literature and Art Graham's...
, published in April. Poe rushed to complete the story in time and later admitted that the conclusion was imperfect. Shortly after Poe's story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
"The Murders in the Rue Morgue" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe published in Graham's Magazine in 1841. It has been claimed as the first detective story; Poe referred to it as one of his "tales of ratiocination". Two works that share some similarities predate Poe's stories, including Das...
" was translated into French without acknowledgment, French readers were seeking out other Poe works and "A Descent into the Maelström" was amongst the earliest translated. Like his other sea adventure works The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket is the only complete novel written by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaling ship called the Grampus...
and The Journal of Julius Rodman
The Journal of Julius Rodman
The Journal of Julius Rodman, Being an Account of the First Passage across the Rocky Mountains of North America Ever Achieved by Civilized Man is an unfinished serial novel by American author Edgar Allan Poe published in 1840.-Plot:...
, "A Descent into the Maelström" was believed by readers to be true and one passage was reprinted in the ninth edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica
Encyclopædia Britannica
The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...
– ironically, it was based on a passage that Poe had lifted from an earlier edition of that same encyclopedia. In June 1845, "A Descent into the Maelström" was collected for the first time as part of Poe's Tales, published by G. P. Putnam's SonsFile:Graham's May 1841 descent.jpg Wiley & Putnam, and also included eleven of his other stories.
Critical response
Shortly after its publication, the April 28 issue of the Daily Chronicle included the notice: "The 'Descent into the Maelstroom' by Edgar A. Poe, Esq., is unworthy of the pen of one whose talents allow him a wider and more ample range." Mordecai M. Noah in Evening Star, however, said the tale "appears to be equal in interest with the powerful article from his pen in the last number, 'The Murder in the Rue Morgue'".Adaptation
In 1986, AmericanUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
wrote music inspired by "A Descent into the Maelström". It was commissioned by the Australian Dance Theatre.