Summary
1. The narrator describes himself as a master of his own _____________.
2. He also describes his childhood school as a “_________-like rampart.”
3. The narrator describes his doppelgänger as possessing a desire to _________, __________, or
mortify him.
4. Both Wilsons were born on __________________.
5. The “moralist” will say that Wilson and the narrator were _________________ companions.
6. The doppelgänger was incapable of speaking at any time above a _________ ______
____________.
7. The narrator perceived that he and his doppelgänger were “alike in general ____________
____ ___________.”
8. At Eton the narrator participated in ______________ lasting until morning.
9. At Oxford, the narrator played cards against _________________ after he had become drunk.
10. Mid-game the doppelgänger arrives, and tells the group to check the linings of the narrator’s
_________.
11. The narrator quits Oxford and flees to __________.
12. In Rome the narrator encounters his doppelgänger again during the Carnival in the
_____________ of De Broglio.
13. The narrator fights his doppelgänger, and plunges his sword through and through his
enemy’s __________.
14. Wilson speaks to the narrator and tells him that he has “utterly ___________ ___________.”
Analysis
.
1. The narrator writes that he “was left to the guidance of [his] own will, and became, in all but
name, master of [his] own
actions,” from an early age (1). Do you think that he was already becoming evil?
2. William Wilson is described as speaking only in “a very low whisper,” (4). Do you think this is
because he is weak and
can’t speak loudly or because he is strong and doesn’t need to?
3. While the narrator is gambling at Oxford, Wilson appears and exposes him as a cheat. Why do
you think that Wilson would do this to the narrator?
4. What is the underlying theme or morale to the story?
5. Poe was ahead of his time in psychological theory. What symbolic elements can be seen
from his use of a “doppelganger”?
6. Does Freud’s psychological theory of the Id, Ego and Superego appear in “William
Wilson”? Explain.