William Wilson

At school the narrator rules everyone except one boy, who has the same name, arrived on the same day, and was born on the same date. That boy copies his clothes, his walk and even his voice, and he can only whisper. Years later, at Eton, at Oxford, in Rome and across Europe, the same whisper stops the narrator every time he is about to do something vile. Poe’s tale of a man and his double is also a confession, told by someone who says he is dying and wants your pity.

What happens in William Wilson

The narrator, near death and too ashamed to give his real name, calls himself William Wilson and promises to explain how he fell from ordinary wickedness into far worse crime. Spoiled by weak parents, he grows up willful. At Dr. Bransby’s school, a rambling old house in an English village, he rules his classmates except one: a boy with the same first name and surname who entered on the same day and, he later learns, was born on the same date. This second William Wilson competes with him, refuses to obey him, and slyly copies his dress, walk and manner. A weakness of the throat keeps him from speaking above a low whisper, yet his whisper becomes an echo of the narrator’s voice. He also offers quiet advice, which the narrator hates but later admits was wiser than his own. One night after a violent quarrel, the narrator creeps with a lamp to his rival’s bed to play a cruel trick, looks at the sleeping face, and is seized by such horror that he leaves the school that night for good. After months at home he goes to Eton and sinks into drinking. During a dawn party, a youth dressed like him appears in the dark hall, whispers the name William Wilson in his ear, and vanishes. At Oxford the narrator becomes a card cheat and sets out to ruin Glendinning, a rich young nobleman of weak intellect, at écarté. When Glendinning is ruined, a cloaked stranger bursts in, the candles go out, and a whisper tells the company to search the narrator’s sleeve and pockets, where the doctored cards are found. The host, Mr. Preston, hands him a fur cloak from the floor, the exact twin of the one already on his arm. He flees abroad, but in Paris, Rome, Vienna, Berlin, Moscow, Naples and Egypt the double keeps stepping in to spoil his schemes, never showing his face. At last, drunk at a Carnival masquerade in Rome, the narrator is pursuing the young wife of the old Duke Di Broglio when the whisper stops him. He drags the masked double, dressed exactly like him, into a small room and stabs him again and again. Turning back from the door, he seems to see a mirror holding his own pale, bloody image, but it is Wilson, wearing the narrator’s own face, who tells him that he has murdered himself.

Where and when William Wilson happens

Timeline the story arc, beat by beat

1. The school
   A second William Wilson

   At Dr. Bransby’s academy a boy with the narrator’s name, arrival day and birthday becomes the one classmate who will not submit to him.

2. The rivalry
   The whispering copy

   The namesake imitates the narrator’s dress, walk and voice in a whisper and offers quiet advice that the narrator resents.

3. The night
   The sleeper’s face

   Creeping with a lamp to prank his sleeping rival, the narrator is horrified by the face he sees and leaves the school that same night.

4. Eton
   A whisper at dawn

   During a drunken party, a youth dressed like the narrator meets him in a dark hall, whispers his name, and disappears.

5. Oxford
   The cheat exposed

   As the narrator ruins Glendinning at cards, a cloaked stranger tells the company where his hidden cards are, and he must flee Oxford.

6. The pursuit
   Across Europe

   From Paris to Rome, Naples and Egypt, the double keeps appearing to block his schemes, always with his face hidden.

7. The masquerade
   The mirror

   At a Carnival ball in Rome the narrator stabs the masked double and finds the dying man wearing his own face.

Characters and how they connect

Character Relationships who connects to whom, and the themes that bind them

Themes in William Wilson what the story is really about

Symbols & motifs

Conflicts

Literary devices

The double

Poe uses the old figure of the doppelgänger, a second self who shares a person’s name and looks, to dramatize a split within one mind.

Unreliable narrator

The only account comes from a man pleading for sympathy, who admits he is not using his real name and doubts his own senses.

Epigraph

The opening lines about grim conscience as a spectre in the path tell readers how to understand the double before the story begins.

Foreshadowing

The identical names, the shared birthday and the eerie face at the bedside all prepare for the final revelation in the mirror.

Autobiographical detail

Poe gave the narrator his own birthday, the nineteenth of January, and named the headmaster after the Reverend John Bransby, whose school near London he attended as a boy.

Important quotes

The ending of William Wilson, explained

At the Carnival masquerade in Rome, the narrator is chasing the young wife of the old Duke Di Broglio when a hand touches his shoulder and the familiar whisper sounds in his ear. Mad with wine and rage, he drags the masked double into a small room, orders him to draw his sword, and after a brief fight stabs him repeatedly. Someone tries the door, and he turns away for a moment. When he looks back, a large mirror seems to stand where none was before, and in it his own image, pale and bloody, stumbles toward him. It is not a mirror. It is Wilson, mask and cloak on the floor, and every line of his face is the narrator’s own. For the first time the double speaks aloud: the narrator has conquered, but he is now dead to the World, to Heaven and to Hope, because in killing Wilson he has murdered himself. Readers take the double in different ways. Some read him as a real supernatural twin. Some see a hallucination of a guilty, drunken mind, though other people do seem to meet him: a servant brings his message at Eton, and the whole party at Oxford hears his whisper and finds the cards he points to. The most common reading follows the epigraph and treats the double as conscience in human form, since he appears only to prevent wrongdoing and his advice was always better than the narrator’s. On that reading, the murder is the moment the narrator kills his own moral sense. This links the ending to the opening, where he says that virtue dropped from him in an instant and that he has lived ever since in unspeakable misery and unpardonable crime. The story does not settle which reading is true.

Common misreadings

Test yourself

A boy who likes to boss everyone around meets another boy at school with his exact name and birthday. The other boy copies how he dresses and talks, but he can only whisper. As they grow up, the copycat keeps showing up whenever the first boy is about to do something bad, like cheating at cards. The first boy runs all over Europe but can never escape him. Finally, at a costume party, he gets so angry that he stabs his double with a sword. Then he sees that the dying double has his own face and hears that by killing him he has killed himself. Many readers think the double stands for his conscience, the voice inside that tells you right from wrong.

Flashcards flip, self-grade, and the deck remembers what you know

Compare & connect the story universe

Adaptation. Spirits of the Dead (1968, Film).

Discussion & essay prompts for class, or your next paper

Key questions students ask

• Who is the second William Wilson
• What does the ending of William Wilson mean
• Is William Wilson a doppelganger story
• Why does the other William Wilson only whisper
• What happens at Oxford in William Wilson
• What does the epigraph of William Wilson mean