In Poe’s 1832 short story “Manuscript Found in a Bottle,” the narrator’s fear of death compels him to write a diary accounting his days on a ship—and this diary is the story that readers encounter. It is the very existence of this document (that is, the fact that the reader is reading this diary rather than reading about it) that foreshadows the abrupt and disastrous end of this tale.
The passage below signals the terrifying end of “Manuscript Found in a Bottle”:
A feeling, for which I have no name, has taken possession of my soul – a sensation which will admit of no analysis, to which the lessons of bygone times are inadequate, and for which I fear futurity itself will offer me no key.
The narrator’s confusion and inability to name his feelings or the events he is witnessing, and his lack of hope for the future, likewise foreshadow the future depth of his despair as the ship careens toward disaster. The messages he leaves in this diary are personal and carry a sense of private intimacy; the more he writes, the deeper the view readers are able to achieve into his subconsciousness. Thus, the survival of his words as a manuscript, found in a bottle (as the title itself states), becomes all the more chilling, as it represents the final thoughts of a fearful man unaware that his writing will soon be the only thing left of him.
One of Edgar Allan Poe’s most famous short stories, “The Fall of the House of Usher” (written in 1839), begins with a significant amount of foreshadowing, as in the passage below:
Beyond this indication of extensive decay, however, the fabric gave little token of instability. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.
As the narrator comes upon the home of his friend Roderick Usher, he notices a barely perceptible crack in the building of the old manor house, making a zigzag from the roof all the way down into the very foundations of the structure. This tiny fissure in the architecture of the narrator’s friend’s home foreshadows the eventual literal collapse and destruction of the house near the end of the story. Furthermore, these hidden cracks in the Usher family home also foreshadow the fracturing of the people in the family. The cracks in their relationships, like the fissures in the building, might be invisible to outside observers, but all will soon be revealed.
The narrator’s self-introduction at the start of “William Wilson” establishes his status as an unreliable narrator and foreshadows his tragic end:
Let me call myself, for the present, William Wilson. The fair page now lying before me need not be sullied with my real appellation. This has been already too much an object for the scorn—for the horror—for the detestation of my race.
The narrator’s reluctance to give the reader solid details (such as when he gives himself a false moniker rather than providing his real name) demonstrates his untrustworthiness. This initial quote also foreshadows the confusion between the narrator and his doppelgänger in the story, as well as his tragic demise. The narrator continues:
What chance—what one event brought this evil thing to pass, bear with me while I relate. Death approaches; and the shadow which foreruns him has thrown a softening influence over my spirit.
The narrator’s awareness of his own impending death and the “softening influence” this knowledge has over him places the remainder of his account under scrutiny. The narrator’s double identity and his confusion about his own sense of self and identity over the course of the story likewise adds to the reader’s inability to fully trust the perspective laid out before them.
The following passage from the beginning of “The Tell-Tale Heart,” published by Edgar Allan Poe in 1839, is a perfect case study in situational irony:
But you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded—with what caution—with what foresight—with what dissimulation I went to work! I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him.
The narrator’s claim that he was “never kinder” to the old man (i.e. his murder victim) than during the week leading to the man’s death at his very own hands is supremely unexpected in the context of the sentence, thus making this a moment of situational irony. Despite the fact that the old man never wronged him (and despite the fact that the narrator even professes to feel love for the old man), the narrator decides to kill him merely because of his pale blue eye. The narrator’s hatred for the old man is unreasonable and unjustified. Likewise, his sudden kindness while he simultaneously plans to murder the man is totally jarring. In this passage he also directly tells the reader his planned timeline for the actual event of the murder, and thus this moment is also an act of foreshadowing.
In “The Pit and the Pendulum,” published in 1842, Edgar Allan Poe uses foreshadowing to hint at the horrors that await the narrator as a victim of the Inquisition:
I had swooned; but will not say that all of consciousness was lost. What of it there remained I will not attempt to define, or even to describe; yet all was not lost. In the deepest slumber – no! In delirium – no! In a swoon -- no! In death – no! even in the grave all is not lost. Else there is no immortality for man.
This passage serves as a grim bit of foreshadowing in “The Pit and the Pendulum.” As the narrator recounts his memories of his time as a prisoner (and in particular his time being tortured) for the reader, it becomes clear that he at the very least survived whatever it may be that he was put through. The narrator’s insistence on consciousness rather than succumbing to oblivion does unfortunately mean he remembers all of the torments of the inquisition. Throughout the short story, he will wish for some form of escape from the horrors that befall him, but there is no escape from the hard reality of what he is about to endure.
“The Black Cat,” published in 1843, opens with the narrator providing a self-introduction full of heavy foreshadowing, as well as unintentional hints that his trustworthiness may not be the most reliable:
For the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not—and very surely do I not dream. But to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburthen my soul. My immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly, succinctly, and without comment, a series of mere household events.
The passage above sets up the fact that the main events of the story have already occurred and, furthermore, that they have had a terrible, tragic end—the ramifications of which are still ongoing, as the narrator is slated to die by execution. The narrator’s insistence that he is not mad and that the story he is about to tell consists of “mere household events,” even as he admits he does not expect to be believed, is extremely telling. Even more to the point, the narrator’s desire to “unburden” his soul before he dies certainly suggests that the events that led him to this point were more serious than mere trifles. His unwillingness to admit to this fact in the face of his imminent demise demonstrates an inability to own up to his actions and, by extension, an inability to relay this account truthfully.
