Herman Melville
The itinerant sailor Ishmael begins a voyage on the whaling ship Pequod whose captain, Ahab, wishes to exact revenge upon the whale Moby-Dick, who destroyed his last ship and took his leg. As they search for the savage white whale, Ishmael questions all aspects of life. The story is woven in complex, lyrical language and uses many theatrical forms, such as stage direction and soliloquy. It is considered the exemplar of American Romanticism,
...Best known for producing one of the masterworks of American literature, the novel Moby-Dick, Herman Melville also branched out into many other genres of writing over the course of his career. The novella Israel Potter: His Fifty Years in Exile was initially published in serial form in a magazine. It offers a fictionalized account of an American-born man whose remarkable life included time spent as a soldier, sailor, prisoner, spy,
...The critically acclaimed author of that behemoth of nineteenth-century fiction, Moby-Dick, Herman Melville was also an accomplished short story writer whom critics say did much to advance the form. The Piazza Tales collects many of Melville's best-known short works, including Bartleby the Scrivener and Benito Cereno.
Regarded as one of the greatest novellas ever written, Melville's Bartleby, the Scrivener follows a nondescript law clerk, Bartleby, who takes a stand against the tyranny of modern life and makes an art form out of nonconformity in the process. A must-read for fans of classic American literature.
Omoo: A Narrative of the South Seas is the sequel to Melville's Typee, both fictional yet highly autobiographical. The narrator ships on a whaling vessel to Tahiti, where the crew mutinies and are imprisoned. The narrative is full of his observations of the Tahitian customs and way of life. Omoo is based on Melville's experiences in the Society Islands.
Typee is a fictional, but heavily autobiographical book by Herman Melville. Based on his own three weeks as a captive on Nuku Hiva, Melville's protagonist spends four months trapped on the island. Melville also fleshed out the story with details provided by contemporary explorers. The book was his most popular during his lifetime and provided significant groundwork for later tales of European and Pacific cultures meeting.
10) Moby Dick
Sea voyages and the vagaries of life on a ship are constant themes in the work of Herman Melville. In the novel Redburn, Melville sharply contrasts the refined sensibilities of the title character, an upper-class American youth, with the coarse manners of his Liverpudlian shipmates. The novel is notable for its finely drawn characters and piercing social criticism.
The name Herman Melville is synonymous with the pinnacle of American literary achievement, and many regard his novel Moby-Dick as the quintessential work of American fiction. In The Confidence-Man, Melville's final major novel, the author explores the motivations, travails, and personalities of a group of boat passengers en route to New Orleans, as well as the mysterious trickster figure who riles things up at the margins of the group.
...Long before penning Moby-Dick, which many regard as the quintessential American novel, author Herman Melville was captivated by life on the open sea. White Jacket adopts a different perspective, focusing on the brutal treatment that many sailors received at the hands of their superiors. In particular, it has been noted that this novel proved to be instrumental in banning the practice of flogging in several branches of the U.S. military.
...16) Moby Dick
Esta obra maestra de la literatura norteamericana, narra la historia de un hombre -Ajab- dominado por una obsesión: vengarse de Moby Dick, la ballena blanca que le arrebató una pierna. Guiado por su anhelo de venganza, Ahab pretende capturar a la ballena, pero ésta no será presa fácil.