"Ambiguities indeed! One long brain-muddling, soulbewildering ambiguity (to borrow Mr. Melville's style), like Melchisedeck without beginning or end - a labyrinth without a ...

The author's comic experiences in a South Seas setting has him working at odd jobs, viewing traditional rites and customs, and even contriving an audience with the Tahitian Queen.

Presented as narratives of his own South Sea experiences, Melville's first two books had roused incredulity in many readers. Their disbelief, he declared, had been "the main ...

Every person around has a dream world which is influenced by the outer world. But when internal passions try to descend over practical tasks then characters like ''Bartleby ...

Traces Melville's life from his childhood in New York, through his adventures abroad as a sailor, to his creation of "Moby-Dick," and forty years later, to his death, in obscurity.

Stung by the critical reception and lack of commercial success of his previous two works, Moby-Dick and Pierre, Herman Melville became obsessed with the difficulties of ...

One of America's greatest writers, Herman Melville often based his novels on the remarkable experiences of his own life. Unpopular in their time, they are now recognized as ...