Difference between revisions of "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar"

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'''''The Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar''''' is a short story written by [[Edgar Allan Poe]] and first published in 1845. In it, the narrator, a mesmerist, explains how he was able to successfully put a dying man into a trance. For days after death, the corpse remains capable of speech and does not decompose. Poe did not initially claim this tale was fiction, and, knowing little about hypnosis and the details of death at the time, some people believed it was true until Poe later admitted it was a ruse. The book has an element that seems in Oscar Wilde's ''[[The Picture of Dorian Gray]]''.
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'''''The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar''''' is a short story written by [[Edgar Allan Poe]] and first published in 1845. In it, the narrator, a mesmerist, explains how he was able to successfully put a dying man into a trance. For days after death, the corpse remains capable of speech and does not decompose. Poe did not initially claim this tale was fiction, and, knowing little about hypnosis and the details of death at the time, some people believed it was true until Poe later admitted it was a ruse. The story seems to have borrowed its idea from Oscar Wilde's ''[[The Picture of Dorian Gray]]''.
  
I first experienced this story as an audio book in December of 2017. Knowing how limited hypnosis actually is, and that real death means brain death, I knew that the story was either fictional or a hoax, so I wasn't very impressed with it.
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==Personal==
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{{BookStatus
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| Own      =
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| Read    = Audio book.
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| Finished = December 2017.
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}}
  
==Status==
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I read this expand my knowledge of Poe's work. I found it to be quite dreadful.
I do not own a physical copy, but I don't own a physical copy. I have read it and listened to an audio book recording.
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The story is in the public domain.
  
 
==Review==
 
==Review==
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{{BookRating|2}}
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{{Spoilers}}
 
{{Spoilers}}
  
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===Bad===
 
===Bad===
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* Real hypnosis is actually very limited, and actual death means brain death. Anyone with a basic understanding of human physiology would immediately see this as a hoax.
 
* The story, is pretty dark and grotesque. Not really my kind of thing.
 
* The story, is pretty dark and grotesque. Not really my kind of thing.
* Nothing good comes out of it. I guess you could chalk it up to a "don't try to play god" moral, but I usually don't appreciate such psuedo-humility.
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* I guess you could chalk the story up to a cautionary tale against "playing god," but I usually don't appreciate such psuedo-humility.
  
 
===Ugly===
 
===Ugly===
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[[Category: Books|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Books]]
[[Category: Fiction|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Fiction]]
[[Category: Short Stories|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Short Stories]]
[[Category: Media Theme - Horror|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Media Theme - Horror]]
[[Category: Books I've Read|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Public Domain]]
[[Category: Public Domain|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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[[Category: Books That Fail the Bechdel Test]]
[[Category: Books That Fail the Bechdel Test|Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The]]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Facts In the Case of M. Valdemar, The}}

Revision as of 16:04, 15 September 2022

The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and first published in 1845. In it, the narrator, a mesmerist, explains how he was able to successfully put a dying man into a trance. For days after death, the corpse remains capable of speech and does not decompose. Poe did not initially claim this tale was fiction, and, knowing little about hypnosis and the details of death at the time, some people believed it was true until Poe later admitted it was a ruse. The story seems to have borrowed its idea from Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Personal

Own?No.
Read?Audio book.
FinishedDecember 2017.

I read this expand my knowledge of Poe's work. I found it to be quite dreadful.

The story is in the public domain.

Review

Overall:

Rating-2.svg

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

  • Since the people of the 1800s still viewed mesmerism as as a legitimate phenomenon equivalent to magic, I can see how this story would have stirred both fear and intrigue at the time. Too bad for the story that science has progressed so far as to make it clearly fictional today.
  • The word use to describe the rapidly rotting corpse at the end is quite tangible.

Bad

  • Real hypnosis is actually very limited, and actual death means brain death. Anyone with a basic understanding of human physiology would immediately see this as a hoax.
  • The story, is pretty dark and grotesque. Not really my kind of thing.
  • I guess you could chalk the story up to a cautionary tale against "playing god," but I usually don't appreciate such psuedo-humility.

Ugly

  • Nothing.

Links

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