The Murders in the Rue Morgue as the first detective fiction story, the character of Dupin became the prototype for many future fictional detectives, including Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot. The genre is distinctive from a general mystery story in that the focus is on analysis. Poe's role in the creation of the detective story is reflected in the Edgar Awards, given annually by the Mystery Writers of America. "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" also established many tropes that would become common elements in mystery fiction: the eccentric but brilliant detective, the bumbling constabulary, the first-person narration by a close
The Masque of the Red Death (play) and locations used in the Masque of the Red Death, and took advantage of the fact that the Old Town Hall building dated back to 1893, 50 years after the publication of the story (treated as a factual account within the narrative), to weave fiction together with reality. Like the story upon which it is based, the Gold-Bug hunt relied on the decryption of ciphers and puzzles to lead the participants to the "treasure", which was finally discovered by a group of participants buried in a garden within the confines of the Battersea Arts Centre, and upon which the Old