Synopses & Reviews
Billy Budd is Herman Melville's most popular work after Moby-Dick. Melville wrote the novella during the five years before his death, and it was published posthumously in 1924. The essays collected here provide a multifaceted introduction to this major American work.
Review
"The collection as a whole as well as every contributor meets the highest standard of textual criticism and may exemplify the classic principles of carrying on polemics." American Studies International
Synopsis
A collection of essays providing a multifaceted introduction to Herman Melville's Billy Budd.
Synopsis
Billy Budd is Herman Melville's most popular work after Moby-Dick. Melville wrote the novella during the five years before his death, and it was published posthumously in 1924. The essays collected here provide a multifaceted introduction to this major American work.
About the Author
Donald Yannella is the author of American Prose to 1820 (1979), Ralph Waldo Emerson (1982), The Perfect Prodigy Melville on the Birth of Malcolm (1986) and Herman Melville's Malcolm Letter (1992).
Table of Contents
Introduction Donald Yannella; 1. Melville's indirection: Billy Budd, the Genetic text, and 'the deadly space between' John Wenke; 2. Billy Budd and American labour unrest: the case for striking back Larry J. Reynolds; 3. Religion, myth and meaning in the art of Billy Budd, Sailor Gail Coffler; 4. Old man Melville: the rose and the cross R. Milder; Selected Bibliography.