In 1891, the novel, Billy Budd, was published by Herman Melville. Readers claim the novel is a masterpiece, holding controversy about certain characters, especially captain Vere. In 1971, Charles A Reich had written “The Tragedy of Billy Budd” showing that Captain Vere was wrongly accused. In 2002, Robert Martin had written “Is Vere a Hero?” to show that Vere is no hero. Both works support their reasons well using textual evidence, however Reich’s work is more persuasive than Martin’s.
In Robert Martin’s critique, Is Vere a Hero?, he claims that Vere is not a hero. First Vere is a despotic captain. For example, He had manipulated the court of Billy Budd’s trial. Whoever spoke against the captain, Vere, would be killed. Also, when Vere learns about a possible mutiny, he takes the law into his own hands, strictly following the letter of the law and disregarding the spirit of the law. He then weighs both, private conscious and martial law to deal with the given situation. Vere then concludes as martial law being heavier, ruling over divine law with human law. Additionally, Martin point...
"Hard times don't create heroes. It is during the hard times when the 'hero' within us is revealed," is an inspiring quote by Bob Riley that reinforces the mono-myth. Bram Stoker portrays Jonathan Harker in the book Dracula as the "hero". Harker's life will transform as he undergoes his heroic journey.
McQuade, Donald, ed. The Harper American Literature. Harper & Row Publishers: New York, 1987, pp. 1308-1311. This paper is the property of NetEssays.Net Copyright © 1999-2002
Reuben, Paul P. PAL: Perspectives in American Literature- A Research and Reference Guide. Chapter 10: James Baldwin (1924-1987). 3 November 2011. April 2012 .
When inquiring about the comparisons and contrasts between Melville’s Benito Cereno and Frederick Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, Written by Himself, the following question almost inevitably arises: Can a work of fiction and an autobiography be compared at all? Indeed, the structure of the two stories differs greatly. Whereas Douglass’s Narrative adapts a typical pattern of autobiographies, i.e. a chronological order of birth, childhood memories, events that helped shape the narrator etc., Benito Cereno is based on a peculiar three-layered foundation of a central story recounting the main events, a deposition delineating the events prior to the first part, and an ending.
---. “Rip Van Winkle.” The American Tradition in Literature. Vol 1. Eds. George Perkins, et al. 7th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1990: 533-544. 2 vols.
The World Book Encyclopedia. 2000 ed. : p. 78. Griswold, Rufus Wilmot. The "Scarlet Letter" The Library of Literary Criticism of English and American Authors. Ed.
Melville, Herman. Billy Budd, Sailor and Other Stories. Ed. Frederick Busch. New York: Penguin, 1986.
Pimple, Kenneth D. Studies in the Novel. Vol. 45 ed. Denton: Studies in the Novel, University of North Texas, 1993. Print.
In conclusion, this essay analyzes the similarities and differences of the two stories written by Herman Melville, Billy Budd and Bartleby. The settings, characters, and endings in the two stories reveal very interesting comparisons and contrasts. The comparison and contrast also includes the interpretation of the symbolism that Melville used in his two stories. The characters, Billy and Bartleby, could even be considered autobiographical representatives of Herman Melville.
Written by Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor (An Inside Narrative) describes the story of a sailor named William "Billy" Budd who is exchanged for another sailor to work aboard the warship H.M.S. Bellipotent. Billy is described as the Handsome Sailor, and his innocence is exposed through his actions. However, his innocence leads to his ignorance when he is believed to be apart of a mutiny by his rival John Claggart, who is the master-at-arms aboard the ship. Claggart reveals his accusations to Captain Edward Fairfax Vere. Unable to defend himself through words, Budd punches Claggart in the head and kills him. Captain Vere and the drumhead court, the first lieutenant, the captain of marines, and the sailing master, then decide the fate of Billy. Even though they recognize Billy's innocence, Captain Vere and the court decides that he should be hung for his actions. Billy Budd, Sailor ends with the hanging of the Handsome Sailor and concludes with a ballad titled "Billy in the Darbies". During the 1840s, Melville was a seaman for several merchant and whaler ships. Afterwards, he wrote several novels including his novel The Whale, later renamed Moby Dick. After writing the novel Pierre and several short stories and poems, Melville's acclamation as a writer drastically dimenshed, and he began working at the New York Customhouse in the 1860s. After retiring from his job at the New York Customhouse, Melville began writing his poem "Billy in the Darbies," using his experience as a seaman for foundation. When Melville read an article titled "The Mutiny of Sumers," which convicted three sailors of mutiny, one of the officers who convicted them being his cousin, he decided to expand his poem into a longer prose to reveal the inside story o...
The notion of the author has often been disputed when it comes to critical literary studies. The argument centers around one basic question: Should the author be considered when looking at a text? There are numerous reasons given as to why the author is important or why the ...
Roald Barthes’s 1967 critical essay “The Death of the Author” addresses the influence of the author in reading and in analyzing his or her writing, the power of the reader, and the option to ignore the work’s background and focus solely on the work. When critically looking at writing, the author is forced to take sole responsibility for the work. Whether the audience loves or hates, whether critics think it is genius or failure. With this idea the creator’s work has a direct correlation to the creator himself or herself, which according to Barthes seems to take away from the text. In other words, the information not stated within the work defines the work. The historical and biographical elements culminate into a limitation of interpreting the text. Barthes goes on to discuss the text itself appearing as derivative, saying that all texts from a certain era will be read the same due to the cultivation of a culture. The direct intent of the author may be muddled due to the translation from author to text to reader, with the text becoming more of a dictionary than anything else. This point ultimately leads to Barthes’s main point: the reader holds more responsibility to the text than does the author. The complexity of different experiences that come from the author into the text is flattened when it is read. The reader comes blindly and has no personal connection to the text. So much information is condensed and made inaccessible to the viewer. Barthes makes the point that a work may begin with the author, but its last stop is with the reader.
Baym, Franklin, Gottesman, Holland, et al., eds. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. 4th ed. New York: Norton, 1994.
McConnell, Frank. The Modern Novel in America, Regnery, revised edition,1963, pg. 814. Rpt. In World Literature Criticism.
Readings in narrative theory generally help students get the fullest experience from the more confusing or complex texts of the twentieth century. For the purposes of this discussion, I will invoke Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, a work that shows how helpful every aspect of narrative analysis can be. (For those who prefer a shorter text, I can recommend Maurice Blanchot’s “The Madness of the Day,” Margaret Atwood’s “Happy Endings,” or Jeanette Winterson’s “The Poetics of Sex”.)