HERMAN MELVILLE-4

Free will and predestination, man’s pursuit of elusive truth, and the nature of evil and knowledge are some of the important themes in Moby Dick.

Later work (1852 – 1856) included Pierre, a historical novel, Israel Potter, Piazza Tales, a collection of short stories and in 1856, The Confidence Man, and a satirical novel. At the time of his death he lift unpublished his last long work of fiction, Billy Budd. This masterly novelette was not printed until 1924, when a new generation had rediscovered Melville and had begun, to give him overdue recognition as a great writer of philosophical fiction.

HERMAN MELVILLE-3

The first two books were highly successful in attracting the interest of the reading public, because of the novelty of their materials, their workmanlike style, their frankness about sex and their sensational attacks on what was being done to the native people by missionaries on the islands.

Melville’s masterpiece, Moby Dick (1851), recounted a whaling voyage under the leadership of Captain Ahab, who was obsessed with a desire to hunt down the great white whale, Moby Dick. By the time the philosophical and allegorical narrative tells of the long pursuit of this “monster” and of the whale’s final triumph, Melville has covered thoroughly the topic of whales and whalers.