A Historical Guide to Herman Melville

by Giles B. Gunn and Giles Gunn

Book Overview

This collection gathers together original essays dealing with Melville's relations with his historical era, with class, with the marketplace, with ethnic otherness, and with religion. These essays are framed by a new, short biography by Robert Milder, an introduction by Giles Gunn, an illustrated chronology, and a bibliographical essay. Taken together, these pieces afford a fresh and searching set of perspectives on Melville's connections both with...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195142829
• ISBN13: 9780195142822
• Release Date: June 2005
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

gives depth to an understanding of Melville's works

Be aware that Gunn assumes you have read most of Melville's major works. Gunn then attempts here to put those writings in the perspective of Melville's life and the society that he was in - 19th century United States. This provides an authentic context from which his works sprang, and against which they should perhaps best be judged. So we see here threads of major events and ideas that ran through American society, mostly before the Civil War. Some touch upon the religious passions of the times, and on slavery and the classes of the society. Gunn provides valuable depth to an understanding of Melville.