William Wilson: A doppelganger  or hallucination?

As the mad poet’s works start invading their dreams, Mumu takes one last stab at Poe with WILLIAM WILSON and wonders why she’s seeing double

TITLE: “William Wilson” (pp 271-298  from Great Tales And Poems Of Edgar Allan Poe)

AUTHOR: Edgar Allan Poe

GENRE: Dark Fiction

PAGES: 27

FORMAT: Paperback Book

PRICE: US $5.95 / CAN $6.99

After this story, I will be taking a break from Edgar Allan Poe’s works. They’re a lot of fun, but they’re beginning to haunt my dreams. In William Wilson, the most important question I have: is the narrator, who claims to be William Wilson, hallucinating his doppelganger?

At the start, it seemed that the narrator had a lot of vices that he accepted as part of himself. For example, he is pretty prideful. Yet when he goes to school, he meets another student by the same name and dress: William Wilson. They were the same age, and entered the school on the same day. It was a weird coincidence; what’s even stranger is the fact that the student also mimicked his voice, but could not speak above a whisper. Almost like his conscience was trying to talk him out of his bad deeds. This is where I believe he was hallucinating: his good side vs his bad side. And he wanted the vices to win. At one point, the narrator tries to pull a prank on him, but seeing him asleep in the shadows, he couldn’t bring himself to do it; almost like it would hurt himself. 

It caused the narrator to switch schools, it unsettled him so; it drove him to drink. Changing his vice to: Gluttony.  It sounds a lot like he is trying to drown out his good side. Even then, a stranger appeared whispering his name: William Wilson. It scared him and caused him to move to another school once again; his vice changing into Greed and Envy. He tried to scam his fellow classmates out of money and he cheated while doing so, hiding cards within his clothing. Yet, near the end of the event, the lights all went out and the stranger appeared again, still whispering. He warned the classmates that the narrator was cheating the whole time and where to look for the cards on his person. That caused the narrator to leave Britain in its entirety. 

Ah, then the narrator’s next vice: Lust. He wished to be with a pretty woman who was married; she was willing to accept it, even telling him what she would be wearing during the masquerade ball. However, when he got there, the stranger appeared beside him, wearing the same exact costume he put on. It enraged him, and he was still sour from what happened in Britain. So his final vice was Wrath; and at the end, it was revealed he stabbed himself when he was trying to kill the stranger.

I would argue that this is a speed run of the seven deadly sins; I would say Sloth would be when he hesitated on the prank for his doppelganger in the first part of the book, but that may be speculation. I do, however, believe he hallucinated the whole situation and that he told the classmates himself that he cheated while blacked-out, but blamed it on a stranger to ruin his life. When in fact it was himself that ruined his life. 

Mumu the Tricked loves to read and write. It’s easier to sit still and work with their eyes and hands than move around some days. They are hoping to become a successful author and book reviews are quite fun, too. Thank you!

PLEASE NOTE: The views and opinions of the staff of Memento Mori Ink do not necessarily represent those of Memento Mori Ink or Crystal Lake Publishing, nor do the views or opinions of Crystal Lake necessarily represent those of Memento Mori Ink or its staff. Thank you for understanding.