The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym is an archetypal American story of escape from home and family, tracing a young man's rite of passage through a series of terrible brushes with death during a fateful sea voyage. However, it goes much deeper, as Pym encounters various interpretative dilemmas, ultimately leaving the reader with a broken-off ending that defies solution. Apart from its violence and mystery, the tale highlights the act of writing and the problem of representing truth. Layer upon layer of elaborate hoaxes include the author's own role as a ghostwriter of the narrative. Pym, his only novel, has become the key text for understanding Poe. This edition offers eight short tales linked to Pym by their treatment of persistent themes—fantastic voyages, gigantic whirlpools, and premature burials—or by their ironic commentary on Poe's mystique.