The Man of the Crowd

“For some months I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with returning strength, found myself in one of those happy moods which are so precisely the converse of ennui—moods of the keenest appetency, when the film from the mental vision departs—the αχλυξ η πριυ επῆευ—and the intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its every-day condition, as does the vivid yet candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias.”

In these lines, the narrator describes his state of mind as he begins to observe the crowd outside the coffee house. His recovery from extreme illness has heightened his senses, and he imagines that his “intellect” is greater than it would normally be. The complex, flowing syntax of this sentence gives the narrator’s thoughts a poetic quality, reflecting his intelligence and his absorption in his own thoughts. The narrator’s decision to include Greek as well as references to the work of a writer and a philosopher (George Combe and Gorgias) highlights the value the narrator places in philosophy and rhetoric, and therefore demonstrates his appreciation for and understanding of the power of language. This, in turn, reflects Poe’s appreciation.

“At this particular period of the evening I had never before been in a similar situation, and the tumultuous sea of human heads filled me, therefore, with a delicious novelty of emotion. I gave up, at length, all care of things within the hotel, and became absorbed in contemplation of the scene without.”

The narrator’s sense of wonder comes through once again in these lines as he describes the “delicious” pleasure he gets from watching the crowd go by outside. The image of the “tumultuous sea of human heads” reflects not only this sense of amazement but also the vast and uncontrollable nature of the crowd. Like the sea, he implies, the crowd has seemingly immeasurable depth and moves freely and turbulently.

“The tribe of clerks was an obvious one and here I discerned two remarkable divisions. There were the junior clerks of flash houses—young gentlemen with tight coats, bright boots, well-oiled hair, and supercilious lips. Setting aside a certain dapperness of carriage, which may be termed deskism for want of a better word, the manner of these persons seemed to me an exact fac-simile of what had been the perfection of bon ton about twelve or eighteen months before. They wore the cast-off graces of the gentry;—and this, I believe, involves the best definition of the class.”

The “junior clerks” the narrator observes in the crowd seem to be members of the middle class. They are able to afford clothing that was fashionable in the “bon ton,” or high society, a year before, but not what is currently fashionable. This suggests that, while their occupations afford them some level of wealth and status, they do not have as much wealth or status as wealthy landowners. The middle class grew during the 19th century alongside rising urbanization and industrialization.

“There were many individuals of dashing appearance, whom I easily understood as belonging to the race of swell pick-pockets with which all great cities are infested. I watched these gentry with much inquisitiveness, and found it difficult to imagine how they should ever be mistaken for gentlemen by gentlemen themselves. Their voluminousness of wristband, with an air of excessive frankness, should betray them at once.”

These lines establish the characterization of the narrator by revealing the sense of superiority he has over the people outside. When he describes the pickpockets, he claims they have “infested” his great city, suggesting that he finds them akin to a disease in need of curing. The concepts of disease, illness, and infestation—especially on a city-wide scale—connect to the beginning of the story in which the narrator recounts his own illness, which took months for him to overcome. His shock that the gentlemen in the crowd do not recognize the pickpockets for what they are implies that he believes his powers of observation are superior to theirs, highlighting his sense of his own intellect and his ability to overcome disease.

“I saw […] sturdy professional street beggars scowling upon mendicants of a better stamp, whom despair alone had driven forth into the night for charity; feeble and ghastly invalids, upon whom death had placed a sure hand, and who sidled and tottered through the mob, looking every one beseechingly in the face, as if in search of some chance consolation, some lost hope; modest young girls returning from long and late labor to a cheerless home, and shrinking more tearfully than indignantly from the glances of ruffians, whose direct contact, even, could not be avoided; women of the town of all kinds and of all ages—the unequivocal beauty in the prime of her womanhood[…].”

In this lengthy sentence, the narrator lists the different types of people who make up the lower-class members of the crowd, and the descriptions reveal the narrator’s thoughts about them. Amid the beggars and people with disabilities—who are described using words heavy with negative connotations, such as “despair” and “ghastly”—there are “modest young girls” and women with “unequivocal beauty.” In this quote, women are portrayed as innocent, beautiful, and fearful. Separating their descriptions from the rest by identifying them through their gender indicates that the opposing individuals are threatening or unseemly men. This mindset is often depicted in Gothic literature. These gender stereotypes imply that women are pure and powerless victims, while men are considered powerful and predatory, which in turn may reflect the potentially threatening nature of both the narrator and the old man in the story.

“The wild effects of the light enchained me to an examination of individual faces; and although the rapidity with which the world of light flitted before the window, prevented me from casting more than a glance upon each visage, still it seemed that, in my then peculiar mental state, I could frequently read, even in that brief interval of a glance, the history of long years.”

The diction the narrator uses to describe the light in this passage is fanciful and reflects conventions of Romanticism, which often depicts heightened emotion around unrealistic details. This helps to illustrate the narrator’s “peculiar mental state.” The tricks of the light enhance his interest in the faces outside, but—as he admits—he can only “glance” at each of them. This fanciful state of mind calls into question the reliability of the narrator’s perceptions.

“Any thing even remotely resembling that expression I had never seen before. I well remember that my first thought, upon beholding it, was that Retzch, had he viewed it, would have greatly preferred it to his own pictural incarnations of the fiend. As I endeavored, during the brief minute of my original survey, to form some analysis of the meaning conveyed, there arose confusedly and paradoxically within my mind, the ideas of vast mental power, of caution, of penuriousness, of avarice, of coolness, of malice, of blood thirstiness, of triumph, of merriment, of excessive terror, of intense—of supreme despair. I felt singularly aroused, startled, fascinated.”

In this passage, the narrator catches his first glimpse of the old man and observes that he wears an expression unlike anything the narrator has ever seen. The qualities the narrator observes in the old man’s face are sometimes contradictory. He displays emotions like “triumph” and “despair” simultaneously, while he is also poor and greedy, blood-thirsty and terrified. This alludes to the old man’s potential for dual identities—the seen and the unseen—as he thinks and feels many different and seemingly incompatible things at once.

“His clothes, generally, were filthy and ragged; but as he came, now and then, within the strong glare of a lamp, I perceived that his linen, although dirty, was of beautiful texture; and my vision deceived me, or, through a rent in a closely-buttoned and evidently second-handed roquelaire which enveloped him, I caught a glimpse both of a diamond and of a dagger.”

The old man’s clothing is another way that the story reveals his complex and sometimes contradictory character. He wears “beautiful” and fancy clothes, yet they are “filthy and ragged,” and his roquelaire, or cloak, appears to be second-hand. The quality of his clothing gives it a mysterious feel, raising questions about where it came from and what the old man has been through in his past. This air of mystery is only heightened by the diamond and dagger the old man carries under his cloak.

“By and by he passed into a cross street, which, although densely filled with people, was not quite so much thronged as the main one he had quitted. Here a change in his demeanor became evident. He walked more slowly and with less object than before—more hesitatingly. He crossed and re-crossed the way repeatedly without apparent aim; and the press was still so thick that, at every such movement, I was obliged to follow him closely.”

The old man’s behavior in these lines reveals his discomfort in less crowded areas. He becomes both more hesitant and seemingly more nervous, quickly crossing from one side of the street to the other in a possible attempt to remain undetectable. This detail is important to the characterization of the old man; it shows that he is careful, not one to be rushed, and that he is cautious of his surroundings.

“The stranger grew pale. He walked moodily some paces up the once populous avenue, then, with a heavy sigh, turned in the direction of the river, and, plunging through a great variety of devious ways, came out, at length, in view of one of the principal theatres. It was about being closed, and the audience were thronging from the doors. I saw the old man gasp as if for breath while he threw himself amid the crowd; but I thought that the intense agony of his countenance had, in some measure, abated.”

This passage gives a more intense image of the distress that overcomes the old man when he is not among a crowd of other people. The diction used to describe the old man’s demeanor gives him an air of desperation. As he nears the river, he “plung[es]” forward “a great variety of devious ways.” The word “plunge” is often used to describe someone who is jumping quickly into a body of water. Likewise, the man “gasp[s] as if for breath” as one would coming up for air after such a plunge. This suggests that the safety of a crowd is as essential to the old man as air.

“The stranger paused, and, for a moment, seemed lost in thought; then, with every mark of agitation, pursued rapidly a route which brought us to the verge of the city, amid regions very different from those we had hitherto traversed. It was the most noisome quarter of London, where every thing wore the worst impress of the most deplorable poverty, and of the most desperate crime. By the dim light of an accidental lamp, tall, antique, worm-eaten, wooden tenements were seen tottering to their fall, in directions so many and capricious that scarce the semblance of a passage was discernible between them. The paving-stones lay at random, displaced from their beds by the rankly-growing grass. Horrible filth festered in the dammed-up gutters. The whole atmosphere teemed with desolation.”

The bleak and decaying imagery the narrator uses to describe the impoverished outskirts of London adds to the story’s ominous tone. His description of “horrible filth” and “desolation” reveals the conditions in which London’s poorer citizens live. The decaying and unstable buildings, poorly paved roads, and dim lighting suggest that the people who live here have gone overlooked by the rest of the city’s population, and there are no resources that would make this area less dangerous and more comfortable. The narrator associates this area with “desperate crime,” but his descriptions of the filth and crumbling buildings also show sympathy for its impoverished residents.

“Suddenly a corner was turned, a blaze of light burst upon our sight, and we stood before one of the huge suburban temples of Intemperance—one of the palaces of the fiend, Gin.”

The narrator describes the bar he and the old man stumble upon as both a “temple” and a “palace.” Symbolic of religion and monarchy respectively, temples and palaces represent important institutions that have historically been granted a lot of authority. By calling the bar a “temple” and a “palace,” the narrator suggests that, in the modern city, drinking and vice have replaced both religion and royalty as authority figures worthy of worship and respect. The “blaze of light” that greets the narrator and the old man upon turning the corner gives the bar a sense of mysticism and wonder typically associated with institutions such as the church and the monarchy.

“‘This old man,’ I said at length, ‘is the type and the genius of deep crime. He refuses to be alone. He is the man of the crowd. It will be in vain to follow; for I shall learn no more of him, nor of his deeds.’”

The narrator’s description of the old man as “the man of the crowd” is notable. To describe the old man as “of” the crowd implies a sense of belonging, as though being in the crowd is one of the man’s distinctive qualities. Due to this, the narrator will never understand him as an individual separate from the multitude of other people who populate the city.