Table of Contents

Chronology; 1. Introduction Robert S. Levine; 2. 'Race' in Typee and White-Jacket Samuel Otter; 3. The tambourine in glory: African culture and Melville's art Sterling Stuckey; 4. Moby-Dick as revolution John Bryant; 5. Pierre's Domestic Ambiguities Wyn Kelley; 6. 'A- !': unreadability in The Confidence Man Elizabeth Renker; 7. Melville the poet Lawrence Buell; 8. Melville's travelling God Jenny Franchot; 9. Melville and sexuality Robert K. Martin; 10. Melville, labor, and the discourses of reception Cindy Weinstein; 11. 'Bewildering Intertanglement': Melville's engagement with British culture Paul Giles; 12. Afterword Andrew Delbanco.

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Specially commissioned essays provide a critical introduction to one of the most significant writers of nineteenth-century America.

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'Recommended for all libraries collecting materials on the seminal writers of nineteenth-century America.' Reference Reviews