“Lasalle”: A Clue to a “Positive” Reading of “The Pit and the Pendulum”

In “From Room to Room: A Note on the Ending of ‘The Pit and the Pendulum”’ [Poe Studies/Darlc Romanticism 31 (1998): 35-36], Steven Carter argues that the translation “the room” or “the chamber” for the name Lasalle, the general who rescues the narrator/victim of the Inquisition in Poe’s tale, “tips the delicate balance [between ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ readings] in favor of a ‘negative’ reading” (35). However, at least two previous commentators whom Carter has apparently overlooked make use of the same word play in support of “positive” interpretations. The interested reader is referred to Joseph J. Moldenhauer, “Murder as a Fine Art: Basic Connections between Poe’s Aesthetics, Psychology, and Moral Vision” [PMLA 83 (May 1968): 2961, and my own The Rationale of Deception in Poe [(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State Univ. Press, 1979), 2041.