Herman melville

(1819-91)

• 
  born Herman Melvill
  
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    “Melville” = 1830s
    
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  3^rd of 8 children
  
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  father = Allan Melvill
  
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    dry good merchant
    
  • 
    massive debt before debt ($$$$)
    
  • 
    1832: died suddenly & in delirium
    
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  mother = Maria Gansevoort
  
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    daughter of Revolutionary War hero, General Peter Gansevoort
    
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  odd jobs:
  
  • 
    bank
    
  • 
    Albany fur-cap store
    
  • 
    uncle’s Pittsfield farm
    
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    teacher in country school (Whitman)
    
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  sailor:
  
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    cabin boy, Liverpool
    
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    1841: 21, South Seas whaler
    
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    1842: deserter, w/Toby Greene, Marquesas Islands (near Tahiti)
    
    • 
      lived w/cannibals of Tapai Valley for few weeks
      
    • 
       1846 TYPEE
      
    • 
       1847 OMOO
      
      • 
        popular
        
      • 
        travel narratives
        
      • 
        anthropological novelty
        
      • 
        adventure
        
        • 
          SPANISH COLONIALIZATION, Capt. SMITH
          
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    Navy: naval frigate, man-o-war United States
    
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  1847: married Elizabeth Knapp Shaw, 8/4
  
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    daughter of Lemuel Shaw, chief justice of Mass. Supreme Court
    
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    several advances against her inheritance ($$$$)
    
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  novel #3 = bomb
  
  • 
    Mardi,
    
  • 
    experimental –
    
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      spiritual & political allegory
      
    • 
      in travel narrative genre
      
    • 
      philosophical journey
      
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  success:
  
  • 
    Redburn (1849) – Liverpool experiences
    
  • 
    White-Jacket (1850) – United States experiences
    
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  MOBY DICK
  
  • 
    written in stages
    
  • 
    started as straight-forward whaling narrative
    
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    then changed -- experimental
    
    • 
      “Gospels in this century”
      
  • 
    INFLUENCES:
    
    • 
      Shakespeare
      
    • 
      Milton
      
    • 
      Emerson
      
    • 
      Hawthorne
      
  • 
    believed American writer could rival SHAKESPEARE
    
  • 
    infused MD with “dark Shakespearean truths about human nature & the universe that, in this world of lies can be told only covertly & by snatches”
    
    • 
      Emily Dickinson, #1263, p. 1696
      
  • 
    1851 = published
    
  • 
    reviews = +/-
    
    • 
      praised
      
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      called crazy: “writ de lunatic”
      
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  literary-economic dilemma:
  
  • 
    HM to Hawthorne: “What I feel most moved to write, that is banned,--it will not pay. Yet, altogether, write the other way I cannot. So the product is a finalhash, and all my books are botches .”
    
  • 
    $$$$$
    
    • 
      literary prostitution
      
    • 
      literary hackwork
      
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  PIERRE:
  
  • 
    Pierre Glendinnings
    
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    coming of age (bildungsroman)
    
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    domestic novel
    
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    romantic, ethical, intellectual perplexities
    
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    satirical: US literary scene
    
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      timid & genteel succeed
      
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      bold, adventurous fail
      
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    clerical hypocrisy
    
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    family dishonesty
    
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    incestuous sexuality
    
  • 
    reviews: work of a maniac, “HERMAN MELVILLE CRAZY”
    
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  short stories & novellas:
  
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    $$$$$$
    
  • 
    Harper’s & Putnam’s
    
  • 
    HM’s most socially progressive writings
    
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    **critical of American culture
    
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    antebellum culture issues =
    
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      racial & gender inequities
      
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      social changes b/c of coming industrial revolution
      
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      slavery
      
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    protagonists = “absolutely alone in the universe”
    
  • 
    “Benito Cereno”
    
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      slavery
      
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      racism
      
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      stereotypical racist assumptions of captain
      
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      not obviously an attack on slavery
      
    • 
      ignored by abolitionists
      
  • 
    “Bartleby the Scrivener”
    
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  The Confidence Man
  
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    **critical of American culture
    
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    satire, allegory
    
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     basically unread
    
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    selfishness
    
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    duplicitousness
    
    • 
      Emily Dickinson #339, p. 1672
      
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  DEPRESSION:
  
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    failure of experimental, daring works
    
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    $$$$$
    
  • 
    boring gov’t job
    
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     anger, depression (domestic violence????) (insane????)
    
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     Europe trip
    
    • 
       lectures in States @ Rome, statues, travel
      
      • 
        (lecturers)
        
        • 
          Emerson
          
        • 
          Douglass
          
        • 
          Melville
          
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  CIVIL WAR:
  
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    visited battle fields, looking for family members
    
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     Battle-Pieces
    
    • 
      one of the best CW volumes of poetry **
      
    • 
      along with Whitman’s Drum-Taps
      
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  government job
  
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    NY customs inspector
    
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    boring, poor $$$$
    
    • 
      Irving, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Douglass, Melville
      
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  DEATH of SONS:
  
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    1867: Malcolm, 18, suicide
    
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    1886: Stanwix, found dead in San Francisco hotel
    
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     bonds w/wife
    
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    Clarel: 18,000-line poem
    
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      bombed
      
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  ANTEBELLUM: popular, success
  
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  POST-CIVIL WAR: ignored
  
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  REVIVAL: centennial
  
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  = Shakespeare:
  
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    “the great art of telling the truth w/sly indirections of his language”
    
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