Plot Summary
William Wilson
Edgar Allan Poe
William Wilson
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1839
Plot Summary
"William Wilson" is a short story by celebrated American writer Edgar Allan Poe. First published in an 1839 issue of Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, the story later appeared in the 1840 Poe anthology, Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque. Partly inspired by events in Poe's own life, the story follows the title character as he descends into evil because of his experiences with a doppelganger.
Written from the first-person perspective, the tale opens as a troubled man introduces himself to readers, freely admitting he is using a fake name: William Wilson. William explains that he was born into privilege and nobility, and while he condemns his past as a scion of wealth and a spendthrift, he does not take responsibility for what he clearly views as his own downfall. The true fault for his actions, he says, lays with the forces of evil that plague the world and steered him toward the dark fate he now grapples with.
William takes readers back to his childhood in a misty English village, where he lives in luxury with his family and attends the local school. William establishes that, early on in life, he is dominant, wildly creative, strong-willed, and easy to corrupt. At school, there is only one other boy he cannot best, and that is a boy also named William Wilson, born on the same date as the narrator, and looking eerily similar to him as well. This other William acts, moves, and dresses like the narrator, too. Virtually the only difference between the two is the other William's voice, which is just a whisper. The other William often pulls the narrator back from spilling over into vice and evil deeds. One night, the narrator goes into the other William's room, looks in his face, and, for the first time, recoils at the realization that what is now his own exact face is reflected back at him. The narrator flees the school. Later the same week, the other William also leaves.
The narrator's education is not over, however. He eventually makes his way to Eton and Oxford. Nevertheless, his morality is seriously lacking, and he routinely engages in "mischief," to use his own words. One act of mischief is his routine cheating at cards. One night, while cheating during a card game, the other William shows up, his face cloaked and hidden. The other William, because his voice is naturally whisper-soft, informs the other card players that the narrator is cheating.
This is only the beginning of the other William's relentless hounding of the narrator. No matter where the narrator goes in the world, the other William is there, ready to thwart his plans, put an end to his debauchery, and remind him of his shortcomings, imperfections, and moral turpitude.
Everything comes to a head during a masquerade ball at a carnival in Rome. The narrator tries to seduce a married woman, but his attempt derails when the other William, dressed in the same clothes as the narrator, enters, putting a stop to it. Outraged, the narrator pushes William into a private room and plunges a knife into him, effectively killing his doppelganger. As the other William dies, a large mirror mysteriously appears in his place, and in it, the narrator looks at his own face, spattered with blood. Or…is it the face of the dead William? He speaks, his voice no longer a whisper, though the narrator suddenly feels the words forming from his own lips. "In me didst thou exist," he says, "and in my death, see…how utterly thou hast murdered thyself." In the end, the narrator discovers that the other William was his true self all along, someone through whom he lived and experienced a more moral life. In killing him, the narrator kills himself.
While Poe did not have this exact experience, he drew from his own life to create certain settings and situations. He based the misty English village, for instance, on the north London suburb where he spent several years as a child. He based the Williamses' school on the school he attended there. Poe was infamously known for his struggles with vice, which likely became some of the narrator's struggles as well.
"William Wilson" has been adapted into various other art forms. It is the source of a 1913 German film called The Student of Prague. Two other German adaptations followed. It comprises one chapter of the 1968 French-Italian movie Spirits of the Dead, starring Alain Delon as William. The story was also the basis for short films, at least one song, and several comic books. Horror maestro Stephen King cited the story as an inspiration for his 2018 novel The Outsider. Some scholars even claim that Vladimir Nabokov's infamous novel Lolita is a parody of "William Wilson."
Written from the first-person perspective, the tale opens as a troubled man introduces himself to readers, freely admitting he is using a fake name: William Wilson. William explains that he was born into privilege and nobility, and while he condemns his past as a scion of wealth and a spendthrift, he does not take responsibility for what he clearly views as his own downfall. The true fault for his actions, he says, lays with the forces of evil that plague the world and steered him toward the dark fate he now grapples with.
William takes readers back to his childhood in a misty English village, where he lives in luxury with his family and attends the local school. William establishes that, early on in life, he is dominant, wildly creative, strong-willed, and easy to corrupt. At school, there is only one other boy he cannot best, and that is a boy also named William Wilson, born on the same date as the narrator, and looking eerily similar to him as well. This other William acts, moves, and dresses like the narrator, too. Virtually the only difference between the two is the other William's voice, which is just a whisper. The other William often pulls the narrator back from spilling over into vice and evil deeds. One night, the narrator goes into the other William's room, looks in his face, and, for the first time, recoils at the realization that what is now his own exact face is reflected back at him. The narrator flees the school. Later the same week, the other William also leaves.
The narrator's education is not over, however. He eventually makes his way to Eton and Oxford. Nevertheless, his morality is seriously lacking, and he routinely engages in "mischief," to use his own words. One act of mischief is his routine cheating at cards. One night, while cheating during a card game, the other William shows up, his face cloaked and hidden. The other William, because his voice is naturally whisper-soft, informs the other card players that the narrator is cheating.
This is only the beginning of the other William's relentless hounding of the narrator. No matter where the narrator goes in the world, the other William is there, ready to thwart his plans, put an end to his debauchery, and remind him of his shortcomings, imperfections, and moral turpitude.
Everything comes to a head during a masquerade ball at a carnival in Rome. The narrator tries to seduce a married woman, but his attempt derails when the other William, dressed in the same clothes as the narrator, enters, putting a stop to it. Outraged, the narrator pushes William into a private room and plunges a knife into him, effectively killing his doppelganger. As the other William dies, a large mirror mysteriously appears in his place, and in it, the narrator looks at his own face, spattered with blood. Or…is it the face of the dead William? He speaks, his voice no longer a whisper, though the narrator suddenly feels the words forming from his own lips. "In me didst thou exist," he says, "and in my death, see…how utterly thou hast murdered thyself." In the end, the narrator discovers that the other William was his true self all along, someone through whom he lived and experienced a more moral life. In killing him, the narrator kills himself.
While Poe did not have this exact experience, he drew from his own life to create certain settings and situations. He based the misty English village, for instance, on the north London suburb where he spent several years as a child. He based the Williamses' school on the school he attended there. Poe was infamously known for his struggles with vice, which likely became some of the narrator's struggles as well.
"William Wilson" has been adapted into various other art forms. It is the source of a 1913 German film called The Student of Prague. Two other German adaptations followed. It comprises one chapter of the 1968 French-Italian movie Spirits of the Dead, starring Alain Delon as William. The story was also the basis for short films, at least one song, and several comic books. Horror maestro Stephen King cited the story as an inspiration for his 2018 novel The Outsider. Some scholars even claim that Vladimir Nabokov's infamous novel Lolita is a parody of "William Wilson."