Week Five - MS Found in a Bottle and The Gold Bug

MS Found in a Bottle

I am honestly not a fan of this story. I'm not big into ships or anything so this really didn't hold my attention very well. I looked this story up and found that some people thought this story was supposed to be satire but I'm not sure. Was Poe really that against stories about the sea? I don't know, but I don't think I would be surprised. Anyway. The only thing I liked about this story was reading it as a supernatural story... it would explain how the ship gets bigger, why the people on the ship don't see the narrator, etc.
If this story is read as realistic, then it makes no sense. There's no way random brush strokes on a canvas will spell out "Discovery" or that the narrator would have been able to write everything down and stick it in a bottle at the end of the story. Those are just two of things that jump out at me. I like to think of this as a haunted ship story and will keep it like that in my head.

The Gold Bug

This is one story that I did not think I would like but was pleasantly surprised by it. I loved how Poe set the story up and we didn't really know what was happening until the end. He wrote it in such a way that you want to keep reading to find out what is going on.
I'm not sure how much I liked how Poe portrayed Jupiter. I realize that Poe portrayed the three main characters in three different ways and everything, but the fact that he made Jupiter so stupid bugged me. Not all slaves, free or not, were that dumb. Was Poe trying to make a point about slavery with this character? Perhaps. I hate to think that he would think so lowly of a person, though.
One thing I truly love about this story is that there's no murder, it's purely adventure. We don't know we're looking for treasure until it's found... but it's not like we're looking for a murderer or anything. I found myself more into the story because I wasn't sure what Lerand was doing and I liked that. I liked that mystery, I liked that intrigue.