How long does it take to read The Pit and the Pendulum?
The Pit and the Pendulum by Edgar Allan Poe takes about 37 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 37 minutes
An evening's read
First published 1907. 34 pages, about 9,350 words. Written for children.
2 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 1 hour 2 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 37 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 23 minutes |
The page count is the median across 101 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
"The Pit and the Pendulum" is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe and first published in 1842 in the literary annual The Gift: A Christmas and New Year's Present for 1843. The story is about the torments endured by a prisoner of the Spanish Inquisition, though Poe skews historical facts. The narrator of the story describes his experience of being tortured. The story is especially effective at inspiring fear in the reader because of its heavy focus on the senses, such as sound, emphasizing its reality, unlike many of Poe's stories which are aided by the supernatural. The traditional elements established in popular horror tales at the time are followed, but critical reception has been mixed. The tale has been adapted to film several times.
Subjects: American Horror tales, American Short stories, Children's fiction, fear, Horror stories, pendulums
