CINXE.COM

<!DOCTYPE html> <html class="client-nojs vector-feature-language-in-header-enabled vector-feature-language-in-main-page-header-disabled vector-feature-sticky-header-disabled vector-feature-page-tools-pinned-disabled vector-feature-toc-pinned-clientpref-1 vector-feature-main-menu-pinned-disabled vector-feature-limited-width-clientpref-1 vector-feature-limited-width-content-enabled vector-feature-custom-font-size-clientpref-1 vector-feature-appearance-pinned-clientpref-1 vector-feature-night-mode-disabled skin-theme-clientpref-day vector-toc-available" lang="en" dir="ltr"> <head> <meta charset="UTF-8"> <title>Herman Melville - Wikiquote</title> <script>(function(){var className="client-js vector-feature-language-in-header-enabled vector-feature-language-in-main-page-header-disabled vector-feature-sticky-header-disabled vector-feature-page-tools-pinned-disabled vector-feature-toc-pinned-clientpref-1 vector-feature-main-menu-pinned-disabled vector-feature-limited-width-clientpref-1 vector-feature-limited-width-content-enabled vector-feature-custom-font-size-clientpref-1 vector-feature-appearance-pinned-clientpref-1 vector-feature-night-mode-disabled skin-theme-clientpref-day vector-toc-available";var cookie=document.cookie.match(/(?:^|; )enwikiquotemwclientpreferences=([^;]+)/);if(cookie){cookie[1].split('%2C').forEach(function(pref){className=className.replace(new RegExp('(^| )'+pref.replace(/-clientpref-\w+$|[^\w-]+/g,'')+'-clientpref-\\w+( |$)'),'$1'+pref+'$2');});}document.documentElement.className=className;}());RLCONF={"wgBreakFrames":false,"wgSeparatorTransformTable":["",""],"wgDigitTransformTable":["",""],"wgDefaultDateFormat": "dmy","wgMonthNames":["","January","February","March","April","May","June","July","August","September","October","November","December"],"wgRequestId":"a8f637a8-c4f2-43b9-9dd1-1fd416c21b3a","wgCanonicalNamespace":"","wgCanonicalSpecialPageName":false,"wgNamespaceNumber":0,"wgPageName":"Herman_Melville","wgTitle":"Herman Melville","wgCurRevisionId":3622226,"wgRevisionId":3622226,"wgArticleId":862,"wgIsArticle":true,"wgIsRedirect":false,"wgAction":"view","wgUserName":null,"wgUserGroups":["*"],"wgCategories":["1819 births","1891 deaths","Essayists from the United States","Humanists","Novelists from the United States","People from New York City","Philosophical pessimists","Poets from the United States","19th-century poets from the United States","Short story writers from the United States","Travel writers","Educators from the United States","Sailors","Presbyterians from the United States","Unitarians from the United States"],"wgPageViewLanguage":"en","wgPageContentLanguage":"en", "wgPageContentModel":"wikitext","wgRelevantPageName":"Herman_Melville","wgRelevantArticleId":862,"wgIsProbablyEditable":true,"wgRelevantPageIsProbablyEditable":true,"wgRestrictionEdit":[],"wgRestrictionMove":[],"wgNoticeProject":"wikiquote","wgCiteReferencePreviewsActive":true,"wgMediaViewerOnClick":true,"wgMediaViewerEnabledByDefault":true,"wgVisualEditor":{"pageLanguageCode":"en","pageLanguageDir":"ltr","pageVariantFallbacks":"en"},"wgMFDisplayWikibaseDescriptions":{"search":true,"watchlist":true,"tagline":true,"nearby":true},"wgWMESchemaEditAttemptStepOversample":false,"wgWMEPageLength":60000,"wgEditSubmitButtonLabelPublish":true,"wgULSPosition":"interlanguage","wgULSisCompactLinksEnabled":false,"wgVector2022LanguageInHeader":true,"wgULSisLanguageSelectorEmpty":false,"wgWikibaseItemId":"Q4985","wgCheckUserClientHintsHeadersJsApi":["brands","architecture","bitness","fullVersionList","mobile","model","platform","platformVersion"],"wgSiteNoticeId":"2.3"};RLSTATE={ "ext.globalCssJs.user.styles":"ready","site.styles":"ready","user.styles":"ready","ext.globalCssJs.user":"ready","user":"ready","user.options":"loading","skins.vector.search.codex.styles":"ready","skins.vector.styles":"ready","skins.vector.icons":"ready","ext.wikimediamessages.styles":"ready","ext.visualEditor.desktopArticleTarget.noscript":"ready","ext.uls.interlanguage":"ready","wikibase.client.init":"ready","ext.wikimediaBadges":"ready","ext.dismissableSiteNotice.styles":"ready"};RLPAGEMODULES=["mediawiki.page.media","site","mediawiki.page.ready","mediawiki.toc","skins.vector.js","ext.centralNotice.geoIP","ext.centralNotice.startUp","ext.urlShortener.toolbar","ext.centralauth.centralautologin","mmv.bootstrap","ext.visualEditor.desktopArticleTarget.init","ext.visualEditor.targetLoader","ext.echo.centralauth","ext.eventLogging","ext.wikimediaEvents","ext.navigationTiming","ext.uls.interface","wikibase.client.vector-2022","ext.checkUser.clientHints","wikibase.sidebar.tracking", "ext.dismissableSiteNotice"];</script> <script>(RLQ=window.RLQ||[]).push(function(){mw.loader.impl(function(){return["user.options@12s5i",function($,jQuery,require,module){mw.user.tokens.set({"patrolToken":"+\\","watchToken":"+\\","csrfToken":"+\\"}); }];});});</script> <link rel="stylesheet" href="/w/load.php?lang=en&modules=ext.dismissableSiteNotice.styles%7Cext.uls.interlanguage%7Cext.visualEditor.desktopArticleTarget.noscript%7Cext.wikimediaBadges%7Cext.wikimediamessages.styles%7Cskins.vector.icons%2Cstyles%7Cskins.vector.search.codex.styles%7Cwikibase.client.init&only=styles&skin=vector-2022"> <script async="" src="/w/load.php?lang=en&modules=startup&only=scripts&raw=1&skin=vector-2022"></script> <meta name="ResourceLoaderDynamicStyles" content=""> <link rel="stylesheet" href="/w/load.php?lang=en&modules=site.styles&only=styles&skin=vector-2022"> <meta name="generator" content="MediaWiki 1.44.0-wmf.5"> <meta name="referrer" content="origin"> <meta name="referrer" content="origin-when-cross-origin"> <meta name="robots" content="max-image-preview:standard"> <meta name="format-detection" content="telephone=no"> <meta property="og:image" content="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1d/Herman_Melville_1860.jpg"> <meta property="og:image:width" content="1200"> <meta property="og:image:height" content="1798"> <meta property="og:image" content="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1d/Herman_Melville_1860.jpg"> <meta property="og:image:width" content="800"> <meta property="og:image:height" content="1198"> <meta property="og:image:width" content="640"> <meta property="og:image:height" content="959"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=1120"> <meta property="og:title" content="Herman Melville - Wikiquote"> <meta property="og:type" content="website"> <link rel="preconnect" href="//upload.wikimedia.org"> <link rel="alternate" media="only screen and (max-width: 640px)" href="//en.m.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville"> <link rel="alternate" type="application/x-wiki" title="Edit" href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit"> <link rel="icon" href="/static/favicon/wikiquote.ico"> <link rel="search" type="application/opensearchdescription+xml" href="/w/rest.php/v1/search" title="Wikiquote (en)"> <link rel="EditURI" type="application/rsd+xml" href="//en.wikiquote.org/w/api.php?action=rsd"> <link rel="canonical" href="https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville"> <link rel="license" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en"> <link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Wikiquote Atom feed" href="/w/index.php?title=Special:RecentChanges&feed=atom"> <link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//meta.wikimedia.org" /> <link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//login.wikimedia.org"> </head> <body class="skin--responsive skin-vector skin-vector-search-vue mediawiki ltr sitedir-ltr mw-hide-empty-elt ns-0 ns-subject mw-editable page-Herman_Melville rootpage-Herman_Melville skin-vector-2022 action-view"><a class="mw-jump-link" href="#bodyContent">Jump to content</a> <div class="vector-header-container"> <header class="vector-header mw-header"> <div class="vector-header-start"> <nav class="vector-main-menu-landmark" aria-label="Site"> <div id="vector-main-menu-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown vector-main-menu-dropdown vector-button-flush-left vector-button-flush-right" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-main-menu-dropdown-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-main-menu-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Main menu" > <label id="vector-main-menu-dropdown-label" for="vector-main-menu-dropdown-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only " aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-menu mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-menu"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Main menu</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="vector-main-menu-unpinned-container" class="vector-unpinned-container"> <div id="vector-main-menu" class="vector-main-menu vector-pinnable-element"> <div class="vector-pinnable-header vector-main-menu-pinnable-header vector-pinnable-header-unpinned" data-feature-name="main-menu-pinned" data-pinnable-element-id="vector-main-menu" data-pinned-container-id="vector-main-menu-pinned-container" data-unpinned-container-id="vector-main-menu-unpinned-container" > <div class="vector-pinnable-header-label">Main menu</div> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-pin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-main-menu.pin">move to sidebar</button> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-unpin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-main-menu.unpin">hide</button> </div> <div id="p-navigation" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-navigation" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> Navigation </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="n-mainpage-description" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Main_Page" title="Visit the main page [z]" accesskey="z"><span>Main page</span></a></li><li id="n-portal" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Wikiquote:Community_Portal" title="About the project, what you can do, where to find things"><span>Community portal</span></a></li><li id="n-Village-pump" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Wikiquote:Village_pump"><span>Village pump</span></a></li><li id="n-recentchanges" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:RecentChanges" title="A list of recent changes in the wiki [r]" accesskey="r"><span>Recent changes</span></a></li><li id="n-randompage" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:Random" title="Load a random page [x]" accesskey="x"><span>Random page</span></a></li><li id="n-help" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Help:Contents" title="The place to find out"><span>Help</span></a></li><li id="n-Contact-Wikiquote" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Wikiquote:Contact_us"><span>Contact Wikiquote</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-Wikiquote_links" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-Wikiquote_links" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> Wikiquote links </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="n-People" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/List_of_people_by_name"><span>People</span></a></li><li id="n-Literary-works" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/List_of_literary_works"><span>Literary works</span></a></li><li id="n-Proverbs" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Category:Proverbs"><span>Proverbs</span></a></li><li id="n-Films" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/List_of_films"><span>Films</span></a></li><li id="n-TV-shows" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/List_of_television_shows"><span>TV shows</span></a></li><li id="n-Themes" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Category:Themes"><span>Themes</span></a></li><li id="n-Categories" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Category:Categories"><span>Categories</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </nav> <a href="/wiki/Main_Page" class="mw-logo"> <img class="mw-logo-icon" src="/static/images/icons/wikiquote.svg" alt="" aria-hidden="true" height="50" width="50"> <span class="mw-logo-container skin-invert"> <img class="mw-logo-wordmark" alt="Wikiquote" src="/static/images/mobile/copyright/wikiquote-wordmark-fr.svg" style="width: 4.8125em; height: 2.5em;"> </span> </a> </div> <div class="vector-header-end"> <div id="p-search" role="search" class="vector-search-box-vue vector-search-box-collapses vector-search-box-show-thumbnail vector-search-box-auto-expand-width vector-search-box"> <a href="/wiki/Special:Search" class="cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only search-toggle" title="Search Wikiquote [f]" accesskey="f"><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-search mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-search"></span> <span>Search</span> </a> <div class="vector-typeahead-search-container"> <div class="cdx-typeahead-search cdx-typeahead-search--show-thumbnail cdx-typeahead-search--auto-expand-width"> <form action="/w/index.php" id="searchform" class="cdx-search-input cdx-search-input--has-end-button"> <div id="simpleSearch" class="cdx-search-input__input-wrapper" data-search-loc="header-moved"> <div class="cdx-text-input cdx-text-input--has-start-icon"> <input class="cdx-text-input__input" type="search" name="search" placeholder="Search Wikiquote" aria-label="Search Wikiquote" autocapitalize="sentences" title="Search Wikiquote [f]" accesskey="f" id="searchInput" > <span class="cdx-text-input__icon cdx-text-input__start-icon"></span> </div> <input type="hidden" name="title" value="Special:Search"> </div> <button class="cdx-button cdx-search-input__end-button">Search</button> </form> </div> </div> </div> <nav class="vector-user-links vector-user-links-wide" aria-label="Personal tools"> <div class="vector-user-links-main"> <div id="p-vector-user-menu-preferences" class="vector-menu mw-portlet emptyPortlet" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-vector-user-menu-userpage" class="vector-menu mw-portlet emptyPortlet" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> </ul> </div> </div> <nav class="vector-appearance-landmark" aria-label="Appearance"> <div id="vector-appearance-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown " title="Change the appearance of the page's font size, width, and color" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-appearance-dropdown-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-appearance-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Appearance" > <label id="vector-appearance-dropdown-label" for="vector-appearance-dropdown-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only " aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-appearance mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-appearance"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Appearance</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="vector-appearance-unpinned-container" class="vector-unpinned-container"> </div> </div> </div> </nav> <div id="p-vector-user-menu-notifications" class="vector-menu mw-portlet emptyPortlet" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-vector-user-menu-overflow" class="vector-menu mw-portlet" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="pt-sitesupport-2" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item user-links-collapsible-item"><a data-mw="interface" href="//donate.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserRedirector?utm_source=donate&utm_medium=sidebar&utm_campaign=C13_en.wikiquote.org&uselang=en" class=""><span>Donate</span></a> </li> <li id="pt-createaccount-2" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item user-links-collapsible-item"><a data-mw="interface" href="/w/index.php?title=Special:CreateAccount&returnto=Herman+Melville" title="You are encouraged to create an account and log in; however, it is not mandatory" class=""><span>Create account</span></a> </li> <li id="pt-login-2" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item user-links-collapsible-item"><a data-mw="interface" href="/w/index.php?title=Special:UserLogin&returnto=Herman+Melville" title="You are encouraged to log in; however, it is not mandatory [o]" accesskey="o" class=""><span>Log in</span></a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> <div id="vector-user-links-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown vector-user-menu vector-button-flush-right vector-user-menu-logged-out" title="More options" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-user-links-dropdown-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-user-links-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Personal tools" > <label id="vector-user-links-dropdown-label" for="vector-user-links-dropdown-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only " aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-ellipsis mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-ellipsis"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Personal tools</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="p-personal" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-personal user-links-collapsible-item" title="User menu" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="pt-sitesupport" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="//donate.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserRedirector?utm_source=donate&utm_medium=sidebar&utm_campaign=C13_en.wikiquote.org&uselang=en"><span>Donate</span></a></li><li id="pt-createaccount" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:CreateAccount&returnto=Herman+Melville" title="You are encouraged to create an account and log in; however, it is not mandatory"><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-userAdd mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-userAdd"></span> <span>Create account</span></a></li><li id="pt-login" class="user-links-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:UserLogin&returnto=Herman+Melville" title="You are encouraged to log in; however, it is not mandatory [o]" accesskey="o"><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-logIn mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-logIn"></span> <span>Log in</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-user-menu-anon-editor" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-user-menu-anon-editor" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> Pages for logged out editors <a href="/wiki/Help:Introduction" aria-label="Learn more about editing"><span>learn more</span></a> </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="pt-anoncontribs" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:MyContributions" title="A list of edits made from this IP address [y]" accesskey="y"><span>Contributions</span></a></li><li id="pt-anontalk" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:MyTalk" title="Discussion about edits from this IP address [n]" accesskey="n"><span>Talk</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </nav> </div> </header> </div> <div class="mw-page-container"> <div class="mw-page-container-inner"> <div class="vector-sitenotice-container"> <div id="siteNotice"><div id="mw-dismissablenotice-anonplace"></div><script>(function(){var node=document.getElementById("mw-dismissablenotice-anonplace");if(node){node.outerHTML="\u003Cdiv class=\"mw-dismissable-notice\"\u003E\u003Cdiv class=\"mw-dismissable-notice-close\"\u003E[\u003Ca tabindex=\"0\" role=\"button\"\u003Ehide\u003C/a\u003E]\u003C/div\u003E\u003Cdiv class=\"mw-dismissable-notice-body\"\u003E\u003C!-- CentralNotice --\u003E\u003Cdiv id=\"localNotice\" data-nosnippet=\"\"\u003E\u003Cdiv class=\"anonnotice\" lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u003Cdiv style=\"position:absolute; z-index:100; right:100px; top:-0px;\" class=\"metadata\" id=\"donate\"\u003E\n\u003Cdiv style=\"text-align:right; font-size:80%\"\u003E\u003Ci\u003EYour \u003Cb\u003E\u003Ca href=\"https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising\" class=\"extiw\" title=\"wikimedia:Fundraising\"\u003Econtinued donations\u003C/a\u003E\u003C/b\u003E keep Wikiquote running!\u003C/i\u003E\n\u003C/div\u003E\u003C/div\u003E\n\u003C/div\u003E\u003C/div\u003E\u003C/div\u003E\u003C/div\u003E";}}());</script></div> </div> <div class="vector-column-start"> <div class="vector-main-menu-container"> <div id="mw-navigation"> <nav id="mw-panel" class="vector-main-menu-landmark" aria-label="Site"> <div id="vector-main-menu-pinned-container" class="vector-pinned-container"> </div> </nav> </div> </div> <div class="vector-sticky-pinned-container"> <nav id="mw-panel-toc" aria-label="Contents" data-event-name="ui.sidebar-toc" class="mw-table-of-contents-container vector-toc-landmark"> <div id="vector-toc-pinned-container" class="vector-pinned-container"> <div id="vector-toc" class="vector-toc vector-pinnable-element"> <div class="vector-pinnable-header vector-toc-pinnable-header vector-pinnable-header-pinned" data-feature-name="toc-pinned" data-pinnable-element-id="vector-toc" > <h2 class="vector-pinnable-header-label">Contents</h2> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-pin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-toc.pin">move to sidebar</button> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-unpin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-toc.unpin">hide</button> </div> <ul class="vector-toc-contents" id="mw-panel-toc-list"> <li id="toc-mw-content-text" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1"> <a href="#" class="vector-toc-link"> <div class="vector-toc-text">Beginning</div> </a> </li> <li id="toc-Quotes" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1 vector-toc-list-item-expanded"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Quotes"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1</span> <span>Quotes</span> </div> </a> <button aria-controls="toc-Quotes-sublist" class="cdx-button cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only vector-toc-toggle"> <span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-expand"></span> <span>Toggle Quotes subsection</span> </button> <ul id="toc-Quotes-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> <li id="toc-White-Jacket_(1850)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#White-Jacket_(1850)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.1</span> <span><i>White-Jacket</i> (1850)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-White-Jacket_(1850)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Hawthorne_and_His_Mosses_(1850)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Hawthorne_and_His_Mosses_(1850)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.2</span> <span><i>Hawthorne and His Mosses</i> (1850)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Hawthorne_and_His_Mosses_(1850)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Moby-Dick:_or,_the_Whale_(1851)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Moby-Dick:_or,_the_Whale_(1851)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.3</span> <span><i>Moby-Dick: or, the Whale</i> (1851)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Moby-Dick:_or,_the_Whale_(1851)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities_(1852)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities_(1852)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.4</span> <span><i>Pierre: or, The Ambiguities</i> (1852)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities_(1852)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Bartleby,_the_Scrivener_(1853)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Bartleby,_the_Scrivener_(1853)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.5</span> <span><i>Bartleby, the Scrivener</i> (1853)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Bartleby,_the_Scrivener_(1853)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-The_Encantadas_(1854)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#The_Encantadas_(1854)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.6</span> <span><i>The Encantadas</i> (1854)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-The_Encantadas_(1854)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Poor_Man's_Pudding_and_Rich_Man's_Crumbs_(1854)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Poor_Man's_Pudding_and_Rich_Man's_Crumbs_(1854)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.7</span> <span><i>Poor Man's Pudding and Rich Man's Crumbs</i> (1854)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Poor_Man's_Pudding_and_Rich_Man's_Crumbs_(1854)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-The_Confidence-Man:_His_Masquerade_(1857)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#The_Confidence-Man:_His_Masquerade_(1857)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.8</span> <span><i>The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade</i> (1857)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-The_Confidence-Man:_His_Masquerade_(1857)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Battle_Pieces:_And_Aspects_of_the_War_(1860)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Battle_Pieces:_And_Aspects_of_the_War_(1860)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.9</span> <span><i>Battle Pieces: And Aspects of the War</i> (1860)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Battle_Pieces:_And_Aspects_of_the_War_(1860)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Billy_Budd,_the_Sailor_(1891)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Billy_Budd,_the_Sailor_(1891)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">1.10</span> <span><i>Billy Budd, the Sailor</i> (1891)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Billy_Budd,_the_Sailor_(1891)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Misattributed" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1 vector-toc-list-item-expanded"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Misattributed"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">2</span> <span>Misattributed</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Misattributed-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Quotes_about_Melville" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1 vector-toc-list-item-expanded"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Quotes_about_Melville"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">3</span> <span>Quotes about Melville</span> </div> </a> <button aria-controls="toc-Quotes_about_Melville-sublist" class="cdx-button cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only vector-toc-toggle"> <span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-expand"></span> <span>Toggle Quotes about Melville subsection</span> </button> <ul id="toc-Quotes_about_Melville-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> <li id="toc-Editorial_eulogy_in_The_New_York_Times_(2_October_1891)" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Editorial_eulogy_in_The_New_York_Times_(2_October_1891)"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">3.1</span> <span>Editorial eulogy in <i>The New York Times</i> (2 October 1891)</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Editorial_eulogy_in_The_New_York_Times_(2_October_1891)-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-External_links" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1 vector-toc-list-item-expanded"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#External_links"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">4</span> <span>External links</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-External_links-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </nav> </div> </div> <div class="mw-content-container"> <main id="content" class="mw-body"> <header class="mw-body-header vector-page-titlebar"> <nav aria-label="Contents" class="vector-toc-landmark"> <div id="vector-page-titlebar-toc" class="vector-dropdown vector-page-titlebar-toc vector-button-flush-left" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-page-titlebar-toc" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Toggle the table of contents" > <label id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-label" for="vector-page-titlebar-toc-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only " aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-listBullet mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-listBullet"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Toggle the table of contents</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-unpinned-container" class="vector-unpinned-container"> </div> </div> </div> </nav> <h1 id="firstHeading" class="firstHeading mw-first-heading"><span class="mw-page-title-main">Herman Melville</span></h1> <div id="p-lang-btn" class="vector-dropdown mw-portlet mw-portlet-lang" > <input type="checkbox" id="p-lang-btn-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-p-lang-btn" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox mw-interlanguage-selector" aria-label="Go to an article in another language. Available in 26 languages" > <label id="p-lang-btn-label" for="p-lang-btn-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--action-progressive mw-portlet-lang-heading-26" aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-language-progressive mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-language-progressive"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">26 languages</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-ar mw-list-item"><a href="https://ar.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D9%87%D8%B1%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%86_%D9%85%D9%84%D9%81%D9%8A%D9%84" title="هرمان ملفيل – Arabic" lang="ar" hreflang="ar" data-title="هرمان ملفيل" data-language-autonym="العربية" data-language-local-name="Arabic" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>العربية</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-az mw-list-item"><a href="https://az.wikiquote.org/wiki/German_Melvill" title="German Melvill – Azerbaijani" lang="az" hreflang="az" data-title="German Melvill" data-language-autonym="Azərbaycanca" data-language-local-name="Azerbaijani" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Azərbaycanca</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-bg mw-list-item"><a href="https://bg.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D0%A5%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%9C%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BB" title="Херман Мелвил – Bulgarian" lang="bg" hreflang="bg" data-title="Херман Мелвил" data-language-autonym="Български" data-language-local-name="Bulgarian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Български</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-bjn mw-list-item"><a href="https://bjn.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Banjar" lang="bjn" hreflang="bjn" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Banjar" data-language-local-name="Banjar" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Banjar</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-bs mw-list-item"><a href="https://bs.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Bosnian" lang="bs" hreflang="bs" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Bosanski" data-language-local-name="Bosnian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Bosanski</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-ca mw-list-item"><a href="https://ca.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Catalan" lang="ca" hreflang="ca" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Català" data-language-local-name="Catalan" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Català</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-cs mw-list-item"><a href="https://cs.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Czech" lang="cs" hreflang="cs" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Čeština" data-language-local-name="Czech" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Čeština</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-de mw-list-item"><a href="https://de.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – German" lang="de" hreflang="de" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Deutsch" data-language-local-name="German" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Deutsch</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-eo mw-list-item"><a href="https://eo.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Esperanto" lang="eo" hreflang="eo" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Esperanto" data-language-local-name="Esperanto" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Esperanto</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-es mw-list-item"><a href="https://es.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Spanish" lang="es" hreflang="es" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Español" data-language-local-name="Spanish" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Español</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-et mw-list-item"><a href="https://et.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Estonian" lang="et" hreflang="et" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Eesti" data-language-local-name="Estonian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Eesti</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-fa mw-list-item"><a href="https://fa.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D9%87%D8%B1%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%86_%D9%85%D9%84%D9%88%DB%8C%D9%84" title="هرمان ملویل – Persian" lang="fa" hreflang="fa" data-title="هرمان ملویل" data-language-autonym="فارسی" data-language-local-name="Persian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>فارسی</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-fr mw-list-item"><a href="https://fr.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – French" lang="fr" hreflang="fr" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Français" data-language-local-name="French" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Français</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-he mw-list-item"><a href="https://he.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D7%94%D7%A8%D7%9E%D7%9F_%D7%9E%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%95%D7%99%D7%9C" title="הרמן מלוויל – Hebrew" lang="he" hreflang="he" data-title="הרמן מלוויל" data-language-autonym="עברית" data-language-local-name="Hebrew" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>עברית</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-hr mw-list-item"><a href="https://hr.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Croatian" lang="hr" hreflang="hr" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Hrvatski" data-language-local-name="Croatian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Hrvatski</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-hu mw-list-item"><a href="https://hu.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Hungarian" lang="hu" hreflang="hu" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Magyar" data-language-local-name="Hungarian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Magyar</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-it mw-list-item"><a href="https://it.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Italian" lang="it" hreflang="it" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Italiano" data-language-local-name="Italian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Italiano</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-ka mw-list-item"><a href="https://ka.wikiquote.org/wiki/%E1%83%B0%E1%83%94%E1%83%A0%E1%83%9B%E1%83%90%E1%83%9C_%E1%83%9B%E1%83%94%E1%83%9A%E1%83%95%E1%83%98%E1%83%9A%E1%83%98" title="ჰერმან მელვილი – Georgian" lang="ka" hreflang="ka" data-title="ჰერმან მელვილი" data-language-autonym="ქართული" data-language-local-name="Georgian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>ქართული</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-li mw-list-item"><a href="https://li.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Limburgish" lang="li" hreflang="li" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Limburgs" data-language-local-name="Limburgish" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Limburgs</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-lt mw-list-item"><a href="https://lt.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hermanas_Melvilis" title="Hermanas Melvilis – Lithuanian" lang="lt" hreflang="lt" data-title="Hermanas Melvilis" data-language-autonym="Lietuvių" data-language-local-name="Lithuanian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Lietuvių</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-pl mw-list-item"><a href="https://pl.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Polish" lang="pl" hreflang="pl" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Polski" data-language-local-name="Polish" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Polski</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-pt mw-list-item"><a href="https://pt.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Portuguese" lang="pt" hreflang="pt" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Português" data-language-local-name="Portuguese" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Português</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-ru mw-list-item"><a href="https://ru.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D0%93%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%9C%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BB%D0%BB" title="Герман Мелвилл – Russian" lang="ru" hreflang="ru" data-title="Герман Мелвилл" data-language-autonym="Русский" data-language-local-name="Russian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Русский</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-sr mw-list-item"><a href="https://sr.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D0%A5%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%9C%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BB" title="Херман Мелвил – Serbian" lang="sr" hreflang="sr" data-title="Херман Мелвил" data-language-autonym="Српски / srpski" data-language-local-name="Serbian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Српски / srpski</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-tr mw-list-item"><a href="https://tr.wikiquote.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="Herman Melville – Turkish" lang="tr" hreflang="tr" data-title="Herman Melville" data-language-autonym="Türkçe" data-language-local-name="Turkish" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Türkçe</span></a></li><li class="interlanguage-link interwiki-uk mw-list-item"><a href="https://uk.wikiquote.org/wiki/%D0%93%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BD_%D0%9C%D0%B5%D0%BB%D0%B2%D1%96%D0%BB%D0%BB" title="Герман Мелвілл – Ukrainian" lang="uk" hreflang="uk" data-title="Герман Мелвілл" data-language-autonym="Українська" data-language-local-name="Ukrainian" class="interlanguage-link-target"><span>Українська</span></a></li> </ul> <div class="after-portlet after-portlet-lang"><span class="wb-langlinks-edit wb-langlinks-link"><a href="https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Special:EntityPage/Q4985#sitelinks-wikiquote" title="Edit interlanguage links" class="wbc-editpage">Edit links</a></span></div> </div> </div> </div> </header> <div class="vector-page-toolbar"> <div class="vector-page-toolbar-container"> <div id="left-navigation"> <nav aria-label="Namespaces"> <div id="p-associated-pages" class="vector-menu vector-menu-tabs mw-portlet mw-portlet-associated-pages" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="ca-nstab-main" class="selected vector-tab-noicon mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Herman_Melville" title="View the content page [c]" accesskey="c"><span>Page</span></a></li><li id="ca-talk" class="new vector-tab-noicon mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Talk:Herman_Melville&action=edit&redlink=1" rel="discussion" class="new" title="Discussion about the content page (page does not exist) [t]" accesskey="t"><span>Discussion</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="vector-variants-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown emptyPortlet" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-variants-dropdown-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-variants-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Change language variant" > <label id="vector-variants-dropdown-label" for="vector-variants-dropdown-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet" aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">English</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="p-variants" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-variants emptyPortlet" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </nav> </div> <div id="right-navigation" class="vector-collapsible"> <nav aria-label="Views"> <div id="p-views" class="vector-menu vector-menu-tabs mw-portlet mw-portlet-views" > <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="ca-view" class="selected vector-tab-noicon mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Herman_Melville"><span>Read</span></a></li><li id="ca-edit" class="vector-tab-noicon mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit" title="Edit this page [e]" accesskey="e"><span>Edit</span></a></li><li id="ca-history" class="vector-tab-noicon mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=history" title="Past revisions of this page [h]" accesskey="h"><span>View history</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </nav> <nav class="vector-page-tools-landmark" aria-label="Page tools"> <div id="vector-page-tools-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown vector-page-tools-dropdown" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-page-tools-dropdown-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-page-tools-dropdown" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Tools" > <label id="vector-page-tools-dropdown-label" for="vector-page-tools-dropdown-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet" aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Tools</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="vector-page-tools-unpinned-container" class="vector-unpinned-container"> <div id="vector-page-tools" class="vector-page-tools vector-pinnable-element"> <div class="vector-pinnable-header vector-page-tools-pinnable-header vector-pinnable-header-unpinned" data-feature-name="page-tools-pinned" data-pinnable-element-id="vector-page-tools" data-pinned-container-id="vector-page-tools-pinned-container" data-unpinned-container-id="vector-page-tools-unpinned-container" > <div class="vector-pinnable-header-label">Tools</div> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-pin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-page-tools.pin">move to sidebar</button> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-unpin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-page-tools.unpin">hide</button> </div> <div id="p-cactions" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-cactions emptyPortlet vector-has-collapsible-items" title="More options" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> Actions </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="ca-more-view" class="selected vector-more-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Herman_Melville"><span>Read</span></a></li><li id="ca-more-edit" class="vector-more-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit" title="Edit this page [e]" accesskey="e"><span>Edit</span></a></li><li id="ca-more-history" class="vector-more-collapsible-item mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=history"><span>View history</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-tb" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-tb" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> General </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="t-whatlinkshere" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere/Herman_Melville" title="A list of all wiki pages that link here [j]" accesskey="j"><span>What links here</span></a></li><li id="t-recentchangeslinked" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:RecentChangesLinked/Herman_Melville" rel="nofollow" title="Recent changes in pages linked from this page [k]" accesskey="k"><span>Related changes</span></a></li><li id="t-upload" class="mw-list-item"><a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:UploadWizard" title="Upload files [u]" accesskey="u"><span>Upload file</span></a></li><li id="t-specialpages" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/wiki/Special:SpecialPages" title="A list of all special pages [q]" accesskey="q"><span>Special pages</span></a></li><li id="t-permalink" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&oldid=3622226" title="Permanent link to this revision of this page"><span>Permanent link</span></a></li><li id="t-info" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=info" title="More information about this page"><span>Page information</span></a></li><li id="t-cite" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:CiteThisPage&page=Herman_Melville&id=3622226&wpFormIdentifier=titleform" title="Information on how to cite this page"><span>Cite this page</span></a></li><li id="t-urlshortener" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:UrlShortener&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikiquote.org%2Fwiki%2FHerman_Melville"><span>Get shortened URL</span></a></li><li id="t-urlshortener-qrcode" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:QrCode&url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikiquote.org%2Fwiki%2FHerman_Melville"><span>Download QR code</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-coll-print_export" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-coll-print_export" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> Print/export </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li id="coll-create_a_book" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:Book&bookcmd=book_creator&referer=Herman+Melville"><span>Create a book</span></a></li><li id="coll-download-as-rl" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Special:DownloadAsPdf&page=Herman_Melville&action=show-download-screen"><span>Download as PDF</span></a></li><li id="t-print" class="mw-list-item"><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&printable=yes" title="Printable version of this page [p]" accesskey="p"><span>Printable version</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <div id="p-wikibase-otherprojects" class="vector-menu mw-portlet mw-portlet-wikibase-otherprojects" > <div class="vector-menu-heading"> In other projects </div> <div class="vector-menu-content"> <ul class="vector-menu-content-list"> <li class="wb-otherproject-link wb-otherproject-commons mw-list-item"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" hreflang="en"><span>Wikimedia Commons</span></a></li><li class="wb-otherproject-link wb-otherproject-wikipedia badge-Q17437798 badge-goodarticle mw-list-item" title="good article badge"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" hreflang="en"><span>Wikipedia</span></a></li><li class="wb-otherproject-link wb-otherproject-wikisource mw-list-item"><a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Herman_Melville" hreflang="en"><span>Wikisource</span></a></li><li id="t-wikibase" class="wb-otherproject-link wb-otherproject-wikibase-dataitem mw-list-item"><a href="https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Special:EntityPage/Q4985" title="Link to connected data repository item [g]" accesskey="g"><span>Wikidata item</span></a></li> </ul> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </nav> </div> </div> </div> <div class="vector-column-end"> <div class="vector-sticky-pinned-container"> <nav class="vector-page-tools-landmark" aria-label="Page tools"> <div id="vector-page-tools-pinned-container" class="vector-pinned-container"> </div> </nav> <nav class="vector-appearance-landmark" aria-label="Appearance"> <div id="vector-appearance-pinned-container" class="vector-pinned-container"> <div id="vector-appearance" class="vector-appearance vector-pinnable-element"> <div class="vector-pinnable-header vector-appearance-pinnable-header vector-pinnable-header-pinned" data-feature-name="appearance-pinned" data-pinnable-element-id="vector-appearance" data-pinned-container-id="vector-appearance-pinned-container" data-unpinned-container-id="vector-appearance-unpinned-container" > <div class="vector-pinnable-header-label">Appearance</div> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-pin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-appearance.pin">move to sidebar</button> <button class="vector-pinnable-header-toggle-button vector-pinnable-header-unpin-button" data-event-name="pinnable-header.vector-appearance.unpin">hide</button> </div> </div> </div> </nav> </div> </div> <div id="bodyContent" class="vector-body" aria-labelledby="firstHeading" data-mw-ve-target-container> <div class="vector-body-before-content"> <div class="mw-indicators"> </div> <div id="siteSub" class="noprint">From Wikiquote</div> </div> <div id="contentSub"><div id="mw-content-subtitle"></div></div> <div id="mw-content-text" class="mw-body-content"><div class="mw-content-ltr mw-parser-output" lang="en" dir="ltr"><figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Herman_Melville_1860.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1d/Herman_Melville_1860.jpg/220px-Herman_Melville_1860.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="330" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1d/Herman_Melville_1860.jpg 1.5x" data-file-width="259" data-file-height="388" /></a><figcaption>It is better to <a href="/wiki/Fail" class="mw-redirect" title="Fail">fail</a> in originality, than to <a href="/wiki/Succeed" class="mw-redirect" title="Succeed">succeed</a> in <a href="/wiki/Imitation" title="Imitation">imitation</a>. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true <a href="/wiki/Test" class="mw-redirect" title="Test">test</a> of <a href="/wiki/Greatness" title="Greatness">greatness</a>.</figcaption></figure> <p><b><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" class="extiw" title="w:Herman Melville">Herman Melville</a></b> (<a href="/wiki/1_August" class="mw-redirect" title="1 August">1 August</a> <a href="/wiki/1819" class="mw-disambig" title="1819">1819</a> – <a href="/wiki/28_September" class="mw-redirect" title="28 September">28 September</a> <a href="/wiki/1891" class="mw-disambig" title="1891">1891</a>) was an American novelist, essayist, short story writer, and poet of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Renaissance_(literature)" class="extiw" title="w:American Renaissance (literature)">American Renaissance</a> period. </p><p>See also: </p> <dl><dd><i><b><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></b></i></dd> <dd><i><b><a href="/wiki/The_Confidence-Man" title="The Confidence-Man">The Confidence-Man</a></b></i></dd> <dd><a href="/wiki/Billy_Budd_(film)" title="Billy Budd (film)"><i><b>Billy Budd</b></i> (1962 film adaptation of his novel)</a></dd></dl> <meta property="mw:PageProp/toc" /> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Quotes">Quotes</h2><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=1" title="Edit section: Quotes"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg/220px-Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="271" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg/330px-Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e8/Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg/440px-Herman_Melville_by_Joseph_O_Eaton.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1461" data-file-height="1801" /></a><figcaption>I <a href="/wiki/Love" title="Love">love</a> all men who <i>dive</i>. Any <a href="/wiki/Fish" title="Fish">fish</a> can swim near the surface, but it takes a <a href="/wiki/Great" class="mw-redirect" title="Great">great</a> <a href="/wiki/Whale" class="mw-redirect" title="Whale">whale</a> to go down stairs five miles or more; & if he don't attain the bottom, why, all the lead in Galena can't fashion the plumet that will.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG/220px-Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG" decoding="async" width="220" height="141" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG/330px-Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG/440px-Shakespeare_Portrait_Comparisons_2.JPG 2x" data-file-width="557" data-file-height="358" /></a><figcaption>I hold it a <a href="/wiki/Verity" class="mw-redirect" title="Verity">verity</a>, that even <a href="/wiki/William_Shakespeare" title="William Shakespeare">Shakspeare</a>, was not a frank man to the uttermost. And, indeed, who in this intolerant <a href="/wiki/Universe" title="Universe">universe</a> is, or can be? But the <a href="/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_Independence" title="United States Declaration of Independence">Declaration of Independence</a> makes a difference.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6e/Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg/220px-Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="260" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6e/Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg/330px-Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6e/Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg/440px-Rembrandt_Harmensz._van_Rijn_063.jpg 2x" data-file-width="2024" data-file-height="2394" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/Instinct" title="Instinct">Instinct</a> and <a href="/wiki/Study" class="mw-redirect" title="Study">study</a>; <a href="/wiki/Love" title="Love">love</a> and <a href="/wiki/Hate" class="mw-redirect" title="Hate">hate</a>;<br /><a href="/wiki/Audacity" title="Audacity">Audacity</a> — <a href="/wiki/Reverence" title="Reverence">reverence</a>. These must mate,<br />And fuse with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob" class="extiw" title="w:Jacob">Jacob</a>’s <a href="/wiki/Mystic" class="mw-redirect" title="Mystic">mystic</a> <a href="/wiki/Heart" title="Heart">heart</a>,<br />To wrestle with the <a href="/wiki/Angel" class="mw-redirect" title="Angel">angel</a> — <a href="/wiki/Art" title="Art">Art</a>.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li><b>Dolt & ass that I am I have lived more than 29 years, & until a few days ago, never made close acquaintance with the <a href="/wiki/Divine" class="mw-redirect" title="Divine">divine</a> <a href="/wiki/William_Shakespeare" title="William Shakespeare">William</a>. Ah, he's full of sermons-on-the-mount, and gentle, aye, almost as <a href="/wiki/Jesus" title="Jesus">Jesus</a>. I take such men to be <a href="/wiki/Inspired" class="mw-redirect" title="Inspired">inspired</a>.</b> I fancy that this <a href="/wiki/Moment" title="Moment">moment</a> Shakspeare in <a href="/wiki/Heaven" title="Heaven">heaven</a> ranks with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel" class="extiw" title="w:Gabriel">Gabriel</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raphael" class="extiw" title="w:Raphael">Raphael</a> and <a href="/wiki/Michael_(archangel)" title="Michael (archangel)">Michael</a>. And if another <a href="/wiki/Messiah" title="Messiah">Messiah</a> ever comes twill be in Shakesper's person. — I am mad to think how minute a cause has prevented me hitherto from reading Shakspeare. But until now, every copy that was come-atable to me, happened to be in a vile small print unendurable to my eyes which are tender as young sparrows. But chancing to fall in with this glorious edition, I now exult in it, page after page. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evert_Augustus_Duyckinck" class="extiw" title="w:Evert Augustus Duyckinck">Evert Augustus Duyckinck</a> (24 February 1849); published in <i>The Letters of Herman Melville</i> (1960) edited by Merrell R. Davis and William H. Gilman, p. 77</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>I do not oscillate in <a href="/wiki/Ralph_Waldo_Emerson" title="Ralph Waldo Emerson">Emerson</a>'s <a href="/wiki/Rainbow" class="mw-redirect" title="Rainbow">rainbow</a>, but prefer rather to hang myself in mine own halter than swing in any other man's swing. Yet I think Emerson is more than a brilliant fellow.</b> Be his stuff begged, borrowed, or stolen, or of his own domestic manufacture he is an uncommon man. Swear he is a humbug — then is he no common humbug. Lay it down that had not Sir <a href="/wiki/Thomas_Browne" title="Thomas Browne">Thomas Browne</a> lived, Emerson would not have mystified — I will answer, that had not <a href="/wiki/Zachary_Taylor" title="Zachary Taylor">Old Zack</a>'s father begot him, old Zack would never have been <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Palo_Alto" class="extiw" title="w:Battle of Palo Alto">the hero of Palo Alto</a>. The <a href="/wiki/Truth" title="Truth">truth</a> is that we are all sons, grandsons, or nephews or great-nephews of those who go before us. No one is his own sire. — I was very agreeably disappointed in Mr Emerson. I had heard of him as full of transcendentalisms, <a href="/wiki/Myths" class="mw-redirect" title="Myths">myths</a> & oracular gibberish; <b>I had only glanced at a book of his once in Putnam's store — that was all I knew of him, till I heard him lecture. — To my surprise, I found him quite intelligible, tho' to say truth, they told me that that night he was unusually plain.</b> — Now, there is a something about every man elevated above mediocrity, which is, for the most part, instinctuly perceptible. This I see in Mr Emerson. <b>And, frankly, for the sake of the argument, let us call him a <a href="/wiki/Fool" class="mw-disambig" title="Fool">fool</a>; — then had I rather be a fool than a <a href="/wiki/Wise" class="mw-redirect" title="Wise">wise</a> man. — I love all men who <i>dive</i>.</b> Any fish can swim near the surface, but it takes a great whale to go down stairs five miles or more; & if he don't attain the bottom, why, all the lead in Galena can't fashion the plumet that will. <b>I'm not talking of Mr Emerson now — but of the whole corps of thought-divers, that have been diving & coming up again with bloodshot eyes since the <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a> began.</b> <br /> I could readily see in Emerson, notwithstanding his merit, a gaping flaw. It was, the insinuation, that had he lived in those days when the world was made, he might have offered some valuable suggestions. <b>These men are all cracked right across the brow. And never will the pullers-down be able to cope with the builders-up.</b> And this pulling down is easy enough — a keg of powder blew up Block's Monument — but the man who applied the match, could not, alone, build such a pile to save his soul from the shark-maw of the Devil. But enough of this <a href="/wiki/Plato" title="Plato">Plato</a> who talks thro' his nose. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evert_Augustus_Duyckinck" class="extiw" title="w:Evert Augustus Duyckinck">Evert Augustus Duyckinck</a> (3 March 1849); published in <i>The Letters of Herman Melville</i> (1960) edited by Merrell R. Davis and William H. Gilman, p. 78; a portion of this is sometimes modernized in two ways:</li></ul></li></ul> <dl><dd><dl><dd>Now, there is a something about every man elevated above mediocrity, which is for the most part instinctively perceptible.</dd> <dd>Now, there is a something about every man elevated above mediocrity, which is for the most part instantly perceptible.</dd></dl></dd></dl> <ul><li>And do not think, my boy, that because I, impulsively broke forth in jubillations over <a href="/wiki/Shakspeare" class="mw-redirect" title="Shakspeare">Shakspeare</a>, that, therefore, I am of the number of the <i>snobs</i> who burn their tuns of rancid fat at his shrine. No, I would stand afar off & alone, & burn some pure Palm oil, the product of some overtopping trunk. — <b>I would to <a href="/wiki/God" title="God">God</a> Shakspeare had lived later, & promenaded in Broadway.</b> Not that I might have had the pleasure of leaving my card for him at the Astor, or made merry with him over a bowl of the fine Duyckinck punch; but that the muzzle which all men wore on their soul in the Elizebethan day, might not have intercepted Shakspers full articulations. For <b>I hold it a verity, that even Shakspeare, was not a frank man to the uttermost. And, indeed, who in this intolerant <a href="/wiki/Universe" title="Universe">universe</a> is, or can be? But the <a href="/wiki/United_States_Declaration_of_Independence" title="United States Declaration of Independence">Declaration of Independence</a> makes a difference.</b>—There, I have driven my <a href="/wiki/Horse" class="mw-redirect" title="Horse">horse</a> so hard that I have made my inn before sundown. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evert_Augustus_Duyckinck" class="extiw" title="w:Evert Augustus Duyckinck">Evert Augustus Duyckinck</a> (3 March 1849); published in <i>The Letters of Herman Melville</i> (1960) edited by Merrell R. Davis and William H. Gilman, p. 79</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>It will be a strange sort of book</b>, tho', I fear; blubber is blubber you know; tho' you may get oil out of it, the poetry runs as hard as sap from a frozen maple tree; — & to cook the thing up, one must needs throw in a little fancy, which from the nature of the thing, must be ungainly as the gambols of the whales themselves. Yet I mean to give the truth of the thing, spite of this. <ul><li>On <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i>, in a letter to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Henry_Dana,_Jr." class="extiw" title="w:Richard Henry Dana, Jr.">Richard Henry Dana, Jr.</a> (1 May 1850)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>There is a certain tragic phase of <a href="/wiki/Humanity" title="Humanity">humanity</a> which, in our opinion, was never more powerfully embodied than by <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Hawthorne</a>.</b> We mean the tragedies of human thought in its own unbiassed, native, and profounder workings. We think that into no recorded mind has the intense feeling of the usable truth ever entered more deeply than into this man's. By usable truth, we mean the apprehension of the absolute condition of present things as they strike the eye of the man who fears them not, though they do their worst to him, — <b>the man who, like Russia or the British Empire, declares himself a sovereign nature (in himself) amid the powers of heaven, hell, and earth. He may perish; but so long as he exists he insists upon treating with all Powers upon an equal basis.</b> If any of those other Powers choose to withhold certain secrets, let them; that does not impair my sovereignty in myself; that does not make me tributary. <b>And perhaps, after all, there is <i>no</i> secret.</b> We incline to think that the Problem of the Universe is like the Freemason's mighty secret, so terrible to all children. It turns out, at last, to consist in a triangle, a mallet, and an apron, — nothing more!<b> We incline to think that God cannot explain His own secrets, and that He would like a little information upon certain points Himself. We mortals astonish Him as much as He us.</b> But it is this <i>Being</i> of the matter; there lies the knot with which we choke ourselves. <b>As soon as you say <i>Me</i>, a <i>God</i>, a <i>Nature</i>, so soon you jump off from your stool and hang from the beam. Yes, that word is the hangman. Take God out of the dictionary, and you would have Him in the street.</b> <br /> There is the grand truth about Nathaniel Hawthorne. He says NO! in thunder; but the Devil himself cannot make him say <i>yes</i>. For all men who say <i>yes</i>, lie; and all men who say <i>no</i>,—why, they are in the happy condition of judicious, unincumbered travellers in Europe; they cross the frontiers into Eternity with nothing but a carpet-bag, — that is to say, the Ego. Whereas those yes-gentry, they travel with heaps of baggage, and, damn them ! they will never get through the Custom House. What's the reason, Mr. Hawthorne, that in the last stages of metaphysics a fellow always falls to swearing so? I could rip an hour. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a>, including bits of a review of his work that he had written (<i>c.</i> 16 April 1851); published in <i>Nathaniel Hawthorne and His WIfe</i> Vol, I (1884) by Julian Hawthorne, Ch. VIII : Lenox, p. 388</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Not one man in five cycles, who is wise, will expect appreciative recognition from his fellows, or any one of them.</b> Appreciation! Recognition! Is love appreciated? Why, ever since Adam, who has got to the meaning of this great allegory — the world? Then we pigmies must be content to have our paper allegories but ill comprehended. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (July 1851); published in <i>Memories of Hawthorne</i> (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 157</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>In me divine magnanimities are spontaneous and instantaneous — catch them while you can.</b> The world goes round, and the other side comes up. So now I can't write what I felt. But I felt pantheistic then—your heart beat in my ribs and mine in yours, and both in God's. <b>A sense of unspeakable security is in me this moment, on account of your having understood the book. I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb.</b> Ineffable socialities are in me. I would sit down and dine with you and all the Gods in old Rome's Pantheon. <b>It is a strange feeling — no hopelessness is in it, no despair. Content — that is it; and irresponsibility; but without licentious inclination. I speak now of my profoundest sense of being, not of an incidental feeling.</b> <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (July 1851); published in <i>Memories of Hawthorne</i> (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 157</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Whence came you, Hawthorne? By what right do you drink from my flagon of life? And when I put it to my lips — lo, they are yours and not mine. <b>I feel that the <a href="/wiki/Godhead" title="Godhead">Godhead</a> is broken up like the bread at the Supper, and that we are the pieces. Hence this infinite fraternity of feeling.</b> Now, sympathising with the paper, my angel turns over another leaf. You did not care a penny for the book. But, now and then as you read, you understood the pervading thought that impelled the book — and that you praised. Was it not so? You were archangel enough to praise the imperfect body, and embrace the soul. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (July 1851); published in <i>Memories of Hawthorne</i> (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 158</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>The reason the mass of men fear God, and at bottom dislike Him, is because they rather distrust His heart, and fancy Him all brain like a watch. (You perceive I employ a capital initial in the pronoun referring to the Deity; don't you think there is a slight dash of flunkeyism in that usage?) <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (June 1, 1851).</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Truth is ever incoherent, and when the big hearts strike together, the concussion is a little stunning. <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (July 1851); published in <i>Memories of Hawthorne</i> (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 158</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>I am heartily sorry I ever wrote anything about you — it was paltry. Lord, when shall we be done growing? As long as we have anything more to do, we have done nothing. So, now, let us add <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i> to our blessing, and step from that. <b>Leviathan is not the biggest fish; — I have heard of Krakens.</b> <ul><li>Letter to <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> (July 1851); published in <i>Memories of Hawthorne</i> (1897) by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop, p. 158</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>It is — or seems to be — a wise sort of thing, to realise that all that happens to a man in this life is only by way of joke, especially his misfortunes, if he have them. And it is also worth bearing in mind, that the joke is passed round pretty liberally & impartially, so that not very many are entitled to fancy that they in particular are getting the worst of it.</b> <ul><li>Letter to Samuel Savage (24 August 1851), as published in <i>The Writings of Herman Melville : The Northwestern-Newberry Edition</i> (1993), edited by Lynn Horth, Vol. 14, p. 203</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Whoever is not in the possession of leisure can hardly be said to possess independence.</b> They talk of the <i>dignity of work</i>. Bosh. <b>True Work is the <i>necessity</i> of poor humanity's earthly condition. The dignity is in leisure.</b> Besides, <b>99 hundreths of all the <i>work</i> done in the world is either foolish and unnecessary, or harmful and wicked.</b> <ul><li>Letter to Catherine G. Lansing (5 September 1877), published in <i>The Melville Log : A Documentary Life of Herman Melville, 1819-1891</i> (1951) by Jay Leyda, Vol. 2, p. 765</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b><a href="/wiki/Instinct" title="Instinct">Instinct</a> and <a href="/wiki/Study" class="mw-redirect" title="Study">study</a>; <a href="/wiki/Love" title="Love">love</a> and <a href="/wiki/Hate" class="mw-redirect" title="Hate">hate</a>;<br /><a href="/wiki/Audacity" title="Audacity">Audacity</a> — reverence. These must mate,<br />And fuse with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob" class="extiw" title="w:Jacob">Jacob</a>’s <a href="/wiki/Mystic" class="mw-redirect" title="Mystic">mystic</a> <a href="/wiki/Heart" title="Heart">heart</a>,<br />To wrestle with the <a href="/wiki/Angel" class="mw-redirect" title="Angel">angel</a> — <a href="/wiki/Art" title="Art">Art</a>.</b> <ul><li><i><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=libraryscience">Timoleon</a></i>, <i>Art</i> (1891)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Indolence is <a href="/wiki/Heaven" title="Heaven">heaven</a>’s ally here,<br />And <a href="/wiki/Energy" title="Energy">energy</a> the child of <a href="/wiki/Hell" title="Hell">hell</a>:<br />The <a href="/wiki/Good" class="mw-redirect" title="Good">Good</a> <a href="/wiki/Man" title="Man">Man</a> pouring from his pitcher clear<br />But brims the poisoned well. <ul><li><i>Timoleon</i>, <i>Fragments of a Lost Gnostic Poem of the Twelfth Century</i>, Fragment 2</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>In armies, navies, cities, or families, in nature herself, nothing more relaxes good order than misery. <ul><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benito_Cereno" class="extiw" title="w:Benito Cereno"><i>Benito Cereno</i></a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putnam%27s_Magazine" class="extiw" title="w:Putnam's Magazine">Putnam's Monthly</a> (<a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://books.google.com/books?id=TlYAAAAAYAAJ&q=%22In+armies+navies+cities+or+families+in+nature+herself+nothing+more+relaxes+good+order+than+misery%22&pg=PA356#v=onepage">October 1855</a>)</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="White-Jacket_(1850)"><span id="White-Jacket_.281850.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-Jacket" class="extiw" title="w:White-Jacket">White-Jacket</a></i> (1850)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=2" title="Edit section: White-Jacket (1850)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5d/Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG/220px-Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG" decoding="async" width="220" height="332" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5d/Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG/330px-Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5d/Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG/440px-Dzi%C3%B3b_ORP_Iskra.JPG 2x" data-file-width="2048" data-file-height="3089" /></a><figcaption>Oh, give me again the rover's <a href="/wiki/Life" title="Life">life</a> — the <a href="/wiki/Joy" title="Joy">joy</a>, the thrill, the whirl! Let me <a href="/wiki/Feel" class="mw-redirect" title="Feel">feel</a> thee again, old <a href="/wiki/Sea" title="Sea">sea</a>!</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:AgnusDeiWindow.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c1/AgnusDeiWindow.jpg/220px-AgnusDeiWindow.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="220" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c1/AgnusDeiWindow.jpg/330px-AgnusDeiWindow.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c1/AgnusDeiWindow.jpg/440px-AgnusDeiWindow.jpg 2x" data-file-width="640" data-file-height="640" /></a><figcaption> Are there no <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravian_Church" class="extiw" title="w:Moravian Church">Moravians</a> in the <a href="/wiki/Moon" title="Moon">Moon</a>, that not a missionary has yet visited this poor <a href="/wiki/Pagan" class="mw-redirect" title="Pagan">pagan</a> planet of ours, to civilize <a href="/wiki/Civilisation" class="mw-redirect" title="Civilisation">civilisation</a> and christianize <a href="/wiki/Christendom" title="Christendom">Christendom</a>?</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png/220px-Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png" decoding="async" width="220" height="337" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png/330px-Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png/440px-Barye_-_Th%C3%A9s%C3%A9e_Minotaure.png 2x" data-file-width="470" data-file-height="719" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/Nature" title="Nature">Nature</a> has not implanted any <a href="/wiki/Power" title="Power">power</a> in man that was not meant to be exercised at <a href="/wiki/Times" title="Times">times</a>, though too often our powers have been abused.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li>It was not a <i>very</i> white jacket, but white enough, in all conscience, as the sequel will show.<br />The way I came by it was this... <ul><li>Ch. 1, First lines</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Many sensible things banished from high life find an asylum among the mob. <ul><li>Ch. 7</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Oh, give me again the rover's life — the joy, the thrill, the whirl! Let me feel thee again, old sea! let me leap into thy saddle once more. I am sick of these terra firma toils and cares; sick of the dust and reek of towns. Let me hear the clatter of hailstones on icebergs, and not the dull tramp of these plodders, plodding their dull way from their cradles to their graves. Let me snuff thee up, sea-breeze! and whinny in thy spray. Forbid it, sea-gods! intercede for me with Neptune, O sweet Amphitrite, that no dull clod may fall on my coffin! Be mine the tomb that swallowed up Pharaoh and all his hosts; let me lie down with Drake, where he sleeps in the sea. <ul><li>Ch. 19</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Familiarity with <a href="/wiki/Danger" title="Danger">danger</a> makes a <a href="/wiki/Brave" class="mw-redirect" title="Brave">brave</a> man braver, but less daring.</b> Thus with seamen: he who goes the oftenest round Cape Horn goes the most circumspectly. <ul><li>Ch. 23</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>In time of peril, like the needle to the loadstone, obedience, irrespective of rank, generally flies to him who is best fitted to command. <ul><li>Ch. 27</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>We <a href="/wiki/Americans" class="mw-redirect" title="Americans">Americans</a> are the peculiar, chosen people — the <a href="/wiki/Israel" title="Israel">Israel</a> of our time; we bear the ark of the <a href="/wiki/Liberties" class="mw-redirect" title="Liberties">liberties</a> of the <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 36</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Though public libraries have an imposing air, and doubtless contain invaluable volumes, yet, somehow, the books that prove most agreeable, grateful, and companionable, are those we pick up by chance here and there; those which seem put into our hands by Providence; those which pretend to little, but abound in much. <ul><li>Ch. 41</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>A man of <a href="/wiki/True" class="mw-redirect" title="True">true</a> <a href="/wiki/Science" title="Science">science</a>... uses but few hard words, and those only when none other will answer his <a href="/wiki/Purpose" title="Purpose">purpose</a></b>; whereas the smatterer in science... thinks, that by mouthing hard words, he proves that he <a href="/wiki/Understands" class="mw-redirect" title="Understands">understands</a> hard things. <ul><li>Ch. 63</li> <li>This has sometimes been paraphrased: <i>A man thinks that by mouthing hard words he understands hard things.</i> where "hard" can readily be taken to imply "harsh" words rather than those "difficult to understand".</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Are there no <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravian_Church" class="extiw" title="w:Moravian Church">Moravians</a> in the <a href="/wiki/Moon" title="Moon">Moon</a>, that not a missionary has yet visited this poor <a href="/wiki/Pagan" class="mw-redirect" title="Pagan">pagan</a> planet of ours, to civilize <a href="/wiki/Civilisation" class="mw-redirect" title="Civilisation">civilisation</a> and christianize <a href="/wiki/Christendom" title="Christendom">Christendom</a>?</b> <ul><li>Ch. 64</li> <li>This has often been quoted with modernized American spelling, rendering it <i>"to civilize civilization and christianize Christendom?"</i></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>I had now been on board the frigate upward of a year, and remained unscourged; the ship was homeward-bound, and in a few weeks, at most, I would be a free man.</b> And now, after making a hermit of myself in some things, in order to avoid the possibility of the scourge, here it was hanging over me for a thing utterly unforeseen, for a <a href="/wiki/Crime" title="Crime">crime</a> of which I was as utterly <a href="/wiki/Innocent" class="mw-redirect" title="Innocent">innocent</a>. <b>But all that was as naught.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 67</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>I cannot analyse my <a href="/wiki/Heart" title="Heart">heart</a>, though it then stood still within me. But the thing that swayed me to my <a href="/wiki/Purpose" title="Purpose">purpose</a> was not altogether the thought that Captain Claret was about to degrade me, and that I had taken an oath with my <a href="/wiki/Soul" title="Soul">soul</a> that he should not. No, I felt my man's manhood so bottomless within me, that no <a href="/wiki/Word" class="mw-redirect" title="Word">word</a>, no blow, no scourge of Captain Claret could cut me deep enough for that. I but swung to an instinct in me — the instinct diffused through all animated nature, the same that prompts even a worm to turn under the heel. Locking souls-with him, I meant to drag Captain Claret from this earthly tribunal of his to that of <a href="/wiki/Jehovah" title="Jehovah">Jehovah</a> and let Him decide between us. No other way could I escape the scourge. <ul><li>Ch. 67</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b><a href="/wiki/Nature" title="Nature">Nature</a> has not implanted any <a href="/wiki/Power" title="Power">power</a> in man that was not meant to be exercised at times, though too often our powers have been abused.</b> The privilege, inborn and inalienable, that every man has of dying himself, and inflicting <a href="/wiki/Death" title="Death">death</a> upon another, was not given to us without a purpose. <b>These are the last resources of an insulted and unendurable existence.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 67</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>I let nothing slip, however small; and <a href="/wiki/Feel" class="mw-redirect" title="Feel">feel</a> myself actuated by the same motive which has prompted many worthy old chroniclers, to set down the merest trifles concerning things that are destined to pass away entirely from the earth, and which, if not preserved in the nick of time, must infallibly perish from the <a href="/wiki/Memories" class="mw-redirect" title="Memories">memories</a> of man. Who knows that this humble narrative may not hereafter <a href="/wiki/Prove" class="mw-redirect" title="Prove">prove</a> the <a href="/wiki/History" title="History">history</a> of an obsolete barbarism? <b>Who knows that, when men-of-war shall be no more, "White-Jacket" may not be <a href="/wiki/Quoted" class="mw-redirect" title="Quoted">quoted</a> to show to the people in the Millennium what a man-of-war was? <a href="/wiki/God" title="God">God</a> hasten the <a href="/wiki/Time" title="Time">time</a>!</b> <ul><li>Ch. 68</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>The worst of our <a href="/wiki/Evils" class="mw-redirect" title="Evils">evils</a> we <a href="/wiki/Blindly" class="mw-redirect" title="Blindly">blindly</a> inflict upon <a href="/wiki/Ourselves" class="mw-redirect" title="Ourselves">ourselves</a>; our officers cannot remove them, even if they would.</b> From the last ills no being can <a href="/wiki/Save" class="mw-redirect" title="Save">save</a> another; therein each man must be his own saviour. For the rest, whatever befall us, let us never train our murderous guns inboard; let us not mutiny with bloody pikes in our hands. Our Lord High Admiral will yet interpose; and though long ages should elapse, and leave our <a href="/wiki/Wrongs" title="Wrongs">wrongs</a> unredressed, yet, shipmates and world-mates! let us never forget, that, <i><b>Whoever afflict us, whatever surround, <a href="/wiki/Life" title="Life">Life</a> is a <a href="/wiki/Voyage" class="mw-redirect" title="Voyage">voyage</a> that's <a href="/wiki/Homeward" class="mw-redirect" title="Homeward">homeward</a>-bound!</b></i> <ul><li>Ch. 93</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Hawthorne_and_His_Mosses_(1850)"><span id="Hawthorne_and_His_Mosses_.281850.29"></span><i>Hawthorne and His Mosses</i> (1850)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=3" title="Edit section: Hawthorne and His Mosses (1850)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <dl><dd><small>Essay in <i>The Literary World</i> (August 17 & 24, 1850) - <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/nh/hahm.html">Full text online</a></small></dd></dl> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3b/Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg/220px-Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="248" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3b/Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg/330px-Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3b/Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg/440px-Nathaniel_Hawthorne.jpg 2x" data-file-width="3302" data-file-height="3720" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/Genius" title="Genius">Genius</a>, all over the <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>, stands <a href="/wiki/Hand" class="mw-redirect" title="Hand">hand</a> in hand, and one shock of recognition runs the whole <a href="/wiki/Circle" class="mw-redirect" title="Circle">circle</a> round.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Herman_melville.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1a/Herman_melville.jpg/220px-Herman_melville.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="271" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Herman_melville.jpg 1.5x" data-file-width="300" data-file-height="370" /></a><figcaption>In this <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a> of <a href="/wiki/Lies" class="mw-redirect" title="Lies">lies</a>, <a href="/wiki/Truth" title="Truth">Truth</a> is forced to fly like a <a href="/wiki/Scared" class="mw-redirect" title="Scared">scared</a> white doe in the woodlands; and only by cunning glimpses will she reveal herself, as in <a href="/wiki/William_Shakespeare" title="William Shakespeare">Shakespeare</a> and other masters of the <a href="/wiki/Great" class="mw-redirect" title="Great">great</a> <a href="/wiki/Art" title="Art">Art</a> of Telling the Truth, — even though it be covertly, and by snatches.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li><b>Would that all excellent books were foundlings, without father or mother, that so it might be, we could glorify them, without including their ostensible authors.</b> Nor would any true man take exception to this; — least of all, he who writes, — "When the Artist rises high enough to achieve the Beautiful, the symbol by which he makes it perceptible to mortal senses becomes of little value in his eyes, while his spirit possesses itself in the enjoyment of the reality." <ul><li>The last sentence is a quotation of <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>In this world of lies, Truth is forced to fly like a scared white doe in the woodlands; and only by cunning glimpses will she reveal herself, as in <a href="/wiki/William_Shakespeare" title="William Shakespeare">Shakespeare</a> and other masters of the great Art of Telling the Truth, — even though it be covertly, and by snatches.</b> <ul><li>Since at least 1954 this has also been published at times as "<b>Truth is forced to fly like a sacred white doe…</b>", apparently a typographical error.</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of greatness.</b> And if it be said, that continual success is a proof that a man wisely knows his powers, — it is only to be added, that, in that case, he knows them to be small. Let us believe it, then, once for all, that there is no hope for us in these smooth pleasing writers that know their powers.</li></ul> <ul><li>Certain it is, however, that this great power of blackness in him derives its force from its appeals to that Calvinistic sense of Innate Depravity and Original Sin, from whose visitations, in some shape or other, no deeply thinking mind is always and wholly free. For, in certain moods, no man can weigh this world, without throwing in something, somehow like Original Sin, to strike the uneven balance.</li></ul> <ul><li><b>You must have plenty of sea-room to tell the truth in.</b></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Genius, all over the world, stands hand in hand, and one shock of recognition runs the whole circle round.</b></li></ul> <ul><li>I found that but to glean after this man, is better than to be in at the harvest of others.</li></ul> <ul><li>The truth seems to be, that like many other geniuses, this Man of Mosses takes great delight in hoodwinking the world, — at least, with respect to himself. Personally, I doubt not, that he rather prefers to be generally esteemed but a so-so sort of author; being willing to reserve the thorough and acute appreciation of what he is, to that party most qualified to judge — that is, to himself. Besides, at the bottom of their natures, men like Hawthorne, in many things, deem the plaudits of the public such strong presumptive evidence of mediocrity in the object of them, that it would in some degree render them doubtful of their own powers, did they hear much and vociferous braying concerning them in the public</li></ul> <ul><li><b>It is hard to be finite upon an <a href="/wiki/Infinite" class="mw-redirect" title="Infinite">infinite</a> subject, and <a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">all</a> subjects are infinite.</b></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Moby-Dick:_or,_the_Whale_(1851)"><span id="Moby-Dick:_or.2C_the_Whale_.281851.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moby-Dick" class="extiw" title="w:Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick: or, the Whale</a></i> (1851)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=4" title="Edit section: Moby-Dick: or, the Whale (1851)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <dl><dd><small>These quotes are just a few samples, for more from this work, see the page for <i><b><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></b></i></small></dd></dl> <ul><li><b>Call me Ishmael. </b> <ul><li>Ch. 1 : Loomings</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>I have no objection to any person’s religion, be it what it may, so long as that person does not kill or insult any other person, because that other person don’t believe it also.</b> But when a man’s religion becomes really frantic; when it is a positive torment to him; and, in fine, makes this earth of ours an uncomfortable inn to lodge in; then I think it high time to take that individual aside and argue the point with him. <ul><li>Ch. 17 : The Ramadan</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Old age is always wakeful; as if, the longer linked with life, the less man has to do with aught that looks like death. <ul><li>Ch. 29 : Enter Ahab; to Him, Stubb</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks.</b> But in each event — in the living act, the undoubted deed — there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask. <ul><li>Ahab to Starbuck, in Ch. 36 : The Quarter-Deck</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>The drama's done. Why then here does any one step forth? — Because one did survive the wreck.</b> <ul><li>Epilogue</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities_(1852)"><span id="Pierre:_or.2C_The_Ambiguities_.281852.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities" class="extiw" title="w:Pierre: or, The Ambiguities">Pierre: or, The Ambiguities</a></i> (1852)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=5" title="Edit section: Pierre: or, The Ambiguities (1852)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Arco_iris_circular.JPG" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5e/Arco_iris_circular.JPG/220px-Arco_iris_circular.JPG" decoding="async" width="220" height="165" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5e/Arco_iris_circular.JPG/330px-Arco_iris_circular.JPG 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5e/Arco_iris_circular.JPG/440px-Arco_iris_circular.JPG 2x" data-file-width="2592" data-file-height="1944" /></a><figcaption>From without, no wonderful effect is wrought within <a href="/wiki/Ourselves" class="mw-redirect" title="Ourselves">ourselves</a>, unless some interior, responding <a href="/wiki/Wonder" title="Wonder">wonder</a> meets it.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:HermanMelville55.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/HermanMelville55.jpg" decoding="async" width="153" height="211" class="mw-file-element" data-file-width="153" data-file-height="211" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">All</a> Profound things, and <a href="/wiki/Emotions" title="Emotions">emotions</a> of things are preceded and attended by <a href="/wiki/Silence" title="Silence">Silence</a>.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Hoag%27s_object.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/da/Hoag%27s_object.jpg/220px-Hoag%27s_object.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="215" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/da/Hoag%27s_object.jpg/330px-Hoag%27s_object.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/da/Hoag%27s_object.jpg/440px-Hoag%27s_object.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1521" data-file-height="1489" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/Silence" title="Silence">Silence</a> is at once the most harmless and the most awful thing in <a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">all</a> <a href="/wiki/Nature" title="Nature">nature</a>. It speaks of the Reserved <a href="/wiki/Forces" class="mw-redirect" title="Forces">Forces</a> of <a href="/wiki/Fate" title="Fate">Fate</a>. Silence is the only <a href="/wiki/Voice" title="Voice">Voice</a> of our <a href="/wiki/God" title="God">God</a>.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a7/Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG/220px-Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG" decoding="async" width="220" height="293" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a7/Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG/330px-Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a7/Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG/440px-Brocken-tanzawa2.JPG 2x" data-file-width="1200" data-file-height="1600" /></a><figcaption><a href="/wiki/Nature" title="Nature">Nature</a> is not so much her own ever-sweet interpreter, as the mere supplier of that cunning alphabet, whereby selecting and combining as he pleases, each man reads his own peculiar lesson according to his own peculiar <a href="/wiki/Mind" title="Mind">mind</a> and <a href="/wiki/Mood" class="mw-redirect" title="Mood">mood</a>.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li>There are some strange summer mornings in the country, when he who is but a sojourner from the city shall early walk forth into the fields, and be wonder-smitten with the trance-like aspect of the green and golden world. Not a flower stirs; the trees forget to wave; the grass itself seems to have ceased to grow; and all Nature, as if suddenly become conscious of her own profound mystery, and feeling no refuge from it but silence, sinks into this wonderful and indescribable repose. <ul><li>First lines, Bk. I, ch. 1</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>From without, no wonderful effect is wrought within ourselves, unless some interior, responding wonder meets it. That the starry vault shall surcharge the heart with all rapturous marvelings, is only because we ourselves are greater miracles, and superber trophies than all the stars in universal space.</b> Wonder interlocks with wonder; and then the confounding feeling comes. No cause have we to fancy, that a horse, a dog, a fowl, ever stand transfixed beneath yon skyey load of majesty. But our soul's arches underfit into its; and so, prevent the upper arch from falling on us with unsustainable inscrutableness. <ul><li>Bk. III, ch. 1</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Thou hast evoked in me profounder spells than the evoking one, thou face! For me, thou hast uncovered one infinite, dumb, beseeching countenance of mystery, underlying all the surfaces of visible time and space. <ul><li>Bk. III, ch. 1</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>But I shall follow the endless, winding way, — the flowing river in the cave of man; careless whither I be led, reckless where I land.</b> <ul><li>Bk. V, ch. 7</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>What we take to be our strongest tower of delight, only stands at the caprice of the minutest event — the falling of a leaf, the hearing of a voice, or the receipt of one little bit of paper scratched over with a few small characters by a sharpened feather. <ul><li>Bk. IV</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>One trembles to think of that mysterious thing in the soul, which seems to acknowledge no human jurisdiction, but in spite of the individual's own innocent self, will still dream horrid dreams, and mutter unmentionable thoughts. <ul><li>Bk. IV</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>A smile is the chosen vehicle of all ambiguities.</b> <ul><li>Bk. IV, ch. 5</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>All Profound things, and emotions of things are preceded and attended by Silence.</b> <ul><li>Bk. XIV, ch. 1</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Silence is the general consecration of the universe. Silence is the invisible laying on of the Divine Pontiff's hands upon the world. Silence is at once the most harmless and the most awful thing in all nature. It speaks of the Reserved Forces of Fate. Silence is the only Voice of our God.</b> <ul><li>Bk. XIV, ch. 1</li> <li>A paraphrase of the last portion of this has sometimes been cited as a quotation of Melville: <i>God's one and only voice is silence.</i></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>The more and the more that he wrote, and the deeper and the deeper that he dived, Pierre saw the everlasting elusiveness of Truth; the universal lurking insincerity of even the greatest and purest written thoughts. Like knavish cards, the leaves of all great books were covertly packed. He was but packing one set the more; and that a very poor jaded set and pack indeed. So that there was nothing he more spurned, than his own aspirations; nothing he more abhorred than the loftiest part of himself. The brightest success, now seemed intolerable to him, since he so plainly saw, that the brightest success could not be the sole offspring of Merit; but of Merit for the one thousandth part, and nine hundred and ninety-nine combining and dovetailing accidents for the rest. <ul><li>Bk. XXV, ch. 3</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>His was the scorn which thinks it not worth the while to be scornful. Those he most scorned, never knew it. <ul><li>Bk. XXV, ch. 3</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Say what some poets will, Nature is not so much her own ever-sweet interpreter, as the mere supplier of that cunning alphabet, whereby selecting and combining as he pleases, each man reads his own peculiar lesson according to his own peculiar mind and mood. </b> <ul><li>Bk. XXV, ch. 4</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Bartleby,_the_Scrivener_(1853)"><span id="Bartleby.2C_the_Scrivener_.281853.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bartleby,_the_Scrivener" class="extiw" title="w:Bartleby, the Scrivener">Bartleby, the Scrivener</a></i> (1853)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=6" title="Edit section: Bartleby, the Scrivener (1853)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <ul><li>"At present I would prefer not to be a little reasonable," was his mildly cadaverous reply.</li></ul> <ul><li>Nothing so aggravates an earnest person as a passive resistance.</li></ul> <ul><li>Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay, but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none.</li></ul> <ul><li>And here Bartleby makes his home, sole spectator of a solitude which he has seen all populous- a sort of innocent and transformed Marius brooding among the ruins of Carthage!</li></ul> <ul><li>"I would prefer not to." (A line spoken repeatedly by Bartleby).</li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="The_Encantadas_(1854)"><span id="The_Encantadas_.281854.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Encantadas" class="extiw" title="w:The Encantadas">The Encantadas</a></i> (1854)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=7" title="Edit section: The Encantadas (1854)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_(XCIIv).jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/ce/Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg/220px-Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="296" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/ce/Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg/330px-Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/ce/Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg/440px-Nuremberg_chronicles_-_Suns_and_Book_Burning_%28XCIIv%29.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1239" data-file-height="1665" /></a><figcaption>Those whom <a href="/wiki/Books" title="Books">books</a> will <a href="/wiki/Hurt" class="mw-redirect" title="Hurt">hurt</a> will not be proof against events. Events, not books, should be forbid.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li><b>If some <a href="/wiki/Books" title="Books">books</a> are deemed most baneful and their sale forbid, how, then, with deadlier <a href="/wiki/Facts" class="mw-redirect" title="Facts">facts</a>, not <a href="/wiki/Dreams" title="Dreams">dreams</a> of doting men? Those whom books will <a href="/wiki/Hurt" class="mw-redirect" title="Hurt">hurt</a> will not be proof against events. Events, not books, should be forbid.</b> <ul><li>Sketch Eighth</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Poor_Man's_Pudding_and_Rich_Man's_Crumbs_(1854)"><span id="Poor_Man.27s_Pudding_and_Rich_Man.27s_Crumbs_.281854.29"></span><i>Poor Man's Pudding and Rich Man's Crumbs</i> (1854)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=8" title="Edit section: Poor Man's Pudding and Rich Man's Crumbs (1854)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <ul><li><b>Of all the preposterous assumptions of <a href="/wiki/Humanity" title="Humanity">humanity</a> over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well-warmed, and well-fed.</b></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="The_Confidence-Man:_His_Masquerade_(1857)"><span id="The_Confidence-Man:_His_Masquerade_.281857.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Confidence-Man" class="extiw" title="w:The Confidence-Man">The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade</a></i> (1857)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=9" title="Edit section: The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade (1857)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9d/Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg/220px-Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="232" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9d/Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg/330px-Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9d/Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg/440px-Water_drop_on_a_leaf.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1280" data-file-height="1352" /></a><figcaption>Well, there is <a href="/wiki/Sorrow" title="Sorrow">sorrow</a> in the <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>, but <a href="/wiki/Goodness" title="Goodness">goodness</a> too; and goodness that is not greenness, either, no more than sorrow is.</figcaption></figure> <dl><dd><div class="noprint"><i>Main article: <a href="/wiki/The_Confidence-Man" title="The Confidence-Man">The Confidence-Man</a></i></div></dd></dl> <ul><li><b>Well, there is <a href="/wiki/Sorrow" title="Sorrow">sorrow</a> in the <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>, but <a href="/wiki/Goodness" title="Goodness">goodness</a> too; and goodness that is not greenness, either, no more than sorrow is.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 5</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>I cannot tell you how thankful I am for your reminding me about the <a href="/wiki/Apocrypha" title="Apocrypha">apocrypha</a> here. For the <a href="/wiki/Moment" title="Moment">moment</a>, its being such escaped me.</b> <a href="/wiki/Fact" title="Fact">Fact</a> is, when <a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">all</a> is bound up together, it's sometimes <a href="/wiki/Confusing" class="mw-redirect" title="Confusing">confusing</a>. The uncanonical part should be bound distinct. And, now that I think of it, how well did those learned doctors who rejected for us this whole book of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirach" class="extiw" title="w:Sirach">Sirach</a>. I never read anything so calculated to destroy man's confidence in man. <b>This son of Sirach even says — I saw it but just now: 'Take heed of thy <a href="/wiki/Friends" class="mw-redirect" title="Friends">friends</a>'; not, observe, thy seeming friends, thy <a href="/wiki/Hypocritical" class="mw-redirect" title="Hypocritical">hypocritical</a> friends, thy <a href="/wiki/False" class="mw-redirect" title="False">false</a> friends, but thy friends, thy real friends — that is to say, not the truest friend in the world is to be implicitly trusted.</b> Can <a href="/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_de_La_Rochefoucauld" title="François de La Rochefoucauld">Rochefoucault</a> equal that? I should not wonder if his view of human nature, like <a href="/wiki/Niccol%C3%B2_Machiavelli" title="Niccolò Machiavelli">Machiavelli</a>'s, was taken from this Son of Sirach. And to call it wisdom — the Wisdom of the Son of Sirach! Wisdom, indeed! What an ugly thing wisdom must be! Give me the folly that dimples the cheek, say I, rather than the wisdom that curdles the blood. But no, no; it ain't wisdom; <b>it's apocrypha, as you say, sir. For how can that be <a href="/wiki/Trustworthy" class="mw-redirect" title="Trustworthy">trustworthy</a> that teaches distrust?"</b> <ul><li>Ch. 45</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Battle_Pieces:_And_Aspects_of_the_War_(1860)"><span id="Battle_Pieces:_And_Aspects_of_the_War_.281860.29"></span><i>Battle Pieces: And Aspects of the War</i> (1860)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=10" title="Edit section: Battle Pieces: And Aspects of the War (1860)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/95/American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg/220px-American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="212" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/95/American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg/330px-American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/95/American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg/440px-American_Civil_War_Montage_2.jpg 2x" data-file-width="554" data-file-height="533" /></a><figcaption>At the height of their <a href="/wiki/Madness" class="mw-redirect" title="Madness">madness</a><br />The night winds pause,<br />Recollecting themselves;<br />But no lull in these <a href="/wiki/Wars" class="mw-redirect" title="Wars">wars</a>.</figcaption></figure> <dl><dd><small><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12384/12384-h/12384-h.htm">Full text</a> at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Gutenberg" class="extiw" title="w:Project Gutenberg">Project Gutenberg</a> </small></dd></dl> <ul><li><b>With shouts the torrents down the gorges go,<br />And storms are formed behind the storm we feel</b>:<br />The hemlock shakes in the rafter, the oak in the driving keel. <ul><li><i>Misgivings</i>, st. 2</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>The poor old Past,<br />The Future's slave</b>,<br />She drudged through pain and crime<br />To bring about the blissful Prime,<br />Then — perished. There's a grave! <ul><li><i>The Conflict of Convictions</i>, st. 6</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>At the height of their madness<br />The night winds pause,<br />Recollecting themselves;<br />But no lull in these wars.</b> <ul><li>The Armies of the Wilderness<i>, Pt. II, st. 5</i></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Youth is the time when hearts are large,<br />And stirring wars<br />Appeal to the spirit which appeals in turn<br />To the blade it draws. <ul><li><i>On the Slain Collegians</i>, st. 1</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>What troops<br />Of generous boys in happiness thus bred — <br />Saturnians through life's Tempe led,<br />Went from the North and came from the South,<br />With golden mottoes in the mouth,<br />To lie down midway on a bloody bed. <ul><li><i>On the Slain Collegians</i>, st. 2</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Let us be Christians toward our fellow-whites, as well as philanthropists toward the blacks our fellow-men. In all things, and toward all, we are enjoined to do as we would be done by. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>There seems no reason why <a href="/wiki/Patriotism" title="Patriotism">patriotism</a> and narrowness should go together, or why intellectual impartiality should be confounded with political trimming, or why serviceable truth should keep cloistered be a cause not partisan. Yet the work of Reconstruction, if admitted to be feasible at all, demands little but common sense and Christian charity. Little but these? These are much. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Patriotism is not baseness, neither is it inhumanity. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Zeal is not of necessity religion, neither is it always of the same essence with poetry or patriotism. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Benevolence" title="Benevolence">Benevolence</a> and policy—<a href="/wiki/Christianity" title="Christianity">Christianity</a> and <a href="/wiki/Machiavelli" class="mw-redirect" title="Machiavelli">Machiavelli</a>—dissuade from penal severities toward the subdued. Abstinence here is as obligatory as considerate care for our unfortunate fellow-men late in bonds, and, if observed, would equally prove to be wise forecast. The great qualities of the South, those attested in the War, we can perilously alienate, or we may make them nationally available at need. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>For the future of the freed slaves we may well be concerned; but the future of the whole country, involving the future of <a href="/wiki/Black_people" title="Black people">the blacks</a>, urges a paramount claim upon our anxiety. Effective benignity, like the Nile, is not narrow in its bounty, and true <a href="/wiki/Policy" title="Policy">policy</a> is always broad. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Amity" class="mw-redirect" title="Amity">Amity</a> itself can only be maintained by reciprocal respect, and true friends are punctilious equals. <ul><li>Supplement</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Billy_Budd,_the_Sailor_(1891)"><span id="Billy_Budd.2C_the_Sailor_.281891.29"></span><i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Budd_(novel)" class="extiw" title="w:Billy Budd (novel)">Billy Budd, the Sailor</a></i> (1891)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=11" title="Edit section: Billy Budd, the Sailor (1891)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <dl><dd><small>Also known as <i>Foretopman Billy Budd</i> ; written in 1891 but not published until 1924; several varying renditions of it have since been published, drawing upon the notes of Melville.</small></dd></dl> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5c/Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg/220px-Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="116" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5c/Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg/330px-Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5c/Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg/440px-Double-alaskan-rainbow.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1919" data-file-height="1008" /></a><figcaption>Who in the <a href="/wiki/Rainbow" class="mw-redirect" title="Rainbow">rainbow</a> can draw the line where the violet tint ends and the orange tint begins? Distinctly we see the difference of the colors, but where exactly does the one first blendingly enter into the other? So with <a href="/wiki/Sanity" title="Sanity">sanity</a> and <a href="/wiki/Insanity" title="Insanity">insanity</a>.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2a/Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg/220px-Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="143" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2a/Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg/330px-Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2a/Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg/440px-Serapis_and_Bonhomme_Richard.jpg 2x" data-file-width="578" data-file-height="377" /></a><figcaption> Forty years after a battle it is easy for a non-combatant to <a href="/wiki/Reason" title="Reason">reason</a> about how it ought to have been fought. It is another thing personally and under fire to direct the <a href="/wiki/Fighting" title="Fighting">fighting</a> while involved in the obscuring smoke of it. Much so with respect to other emergencies involving considerations both practical and <a href="/wiki/Moral" class="mw-redirect" title="Moral">moral</a>, and when it is imperative promptly to act.</figcaption></figure> <ul><li><b>But are sailors, frequenters of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiddler%27s_Green" class="extiw" title="w:Fiddler's Green">fiddlers' greens</a>, without vices?</b> No; but less often than with landsmen do their vices, so called, partake of crookedness of heart, seeming less to proceed from viciousness than exuberance of vitality after long constraint: frank manifestations in accordance with natural law. <ul><li>Ch. 2</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Struck dead by an <a href="/wiki/Angel" class="mw-redirect" title="Angel">angel</a> of <a href="/wiki/God" title="God">God</a>! Yet the angel must hang!</b> <ul><li>Ch. 19</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Who in the <a href="/wiki/Rainbow" class="mw-redirect" title="Rainbow">rainbow</a> can draw the line where the violet tint ends and the orange tint begins? Distinctly we see the difference of the colors, but where exactly does the one first blendingly enter into the other? So with sanity and insanity.</b> In pronounced cases there is no question about them. But in some supposed cases, in various degrees supposedly less pronounced, to draw the exact line of demarcation few will undertake tho' for a fee some professional experts will. <b>There is <a href="/wiki/Nothing" class="mw-redirect" title="Nothing">nothing</a> nameable but that some men will undertake to do it for pay.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 21</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>In the light of that martial code whereby it was formally to be <a href="/wiki/Judged" class="mw-redirect" title="Judged">judged</a>, <a href="/wiki/Innocence" title="Innocence">innocence</a> and <a href="/wiki/Guilt" title="Guilt">guilt</a> personified in Claggart and Budd in effect changed places.</b> In a <a href="/wiki/Legal" class="mw-redirect" title="Legal">legal</a> view the apparent victim of the tragedy was he who had sought to victimize a man blameless; and the indisputable deed of the latter, navally regarded, constituted the most heinous of <a href="/wiki/Military" title="Military">military</a> <a href="/wiki/Crimes" class="mw-redirect" title="Crimes">crimes</a>. <ul><li>Ch. 21</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Says a writer whom few know,<b> "Forty years after a battle it is easy for a non-combatant to <a href="/wiki/Reason" title="Reason">reason</a> about how it ought to have been fought. It is another thing personally and under fire to direct the <a href="/wiki/Fighting" title="Fighting">fighting</a> while involved in the obscuring smoke of it. Much so with respect to other emergencies involving considerations both practical and moral, and when it is imperative promptly to act." </b> <ul><li>Ch. 21</li> <li>This statement is usually attributed entirely to Melville, but the way he presents it in the story indicates that he might be quoting a lesser known author.</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>In war-time on the field or in the fleet, a mortal punishment decreed by a drum-head court — on the field sometimes decreed by but a nod from the General — follows without delay on the heel of conviction without appeal. <ul><li>Ch. 21</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>If possible, not to let the men so much as surmise that their officers anticipate aught amiss from them is the tacit rule in a military ship. And the more that some sort of trouble should really be apprehended the more do the officers keep that apprehension to themselves; tho' not the less unostentatious vigilance may be augmented. <br /> In the present instance the sentry placed over the prisoner had strict orders to let no one have communication with him but the Chaplain. And certain unobtrusive measures were taken absolutely to insure this point. <ul><li>Ch. 23</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Billy's <a href="/wiki/Agony" class="mw-redirect" title="Agony">agony</a>, mainly proceeding from a generous young heart's virgin experience of the diabolical incarnate and effective in some men — the tension of that agony was over now. <ul><li>Ch. 24</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Marvel not that having been made acquainted with the young sailor's essential innocence (an irruption of heretic thought hard to suppress) the worthy man lifted not a finger to avert the doom of such a martyr to martial discipline. So to do would not only have been as idle as invoking the desert, but would also have been an audacious transgression of the bounds of his function, one as exactly prescribed to him by military law as that of the boatswain or any other naval officer. <b>Bluntly put, a chaplain is the minister of the Prince of <a href="/wiki/Peace" title="Peace">Peace</a> serving in the host of the God of <a href="/wiki/War" title="War">War</a> — Mars. As such, he is as incongruous as a musket would be on the altar at <a href="/wiki/Christmas" title="Christmas">Christmas</a>. Why then is he there? Because he indirectly subserves the <a href="/wiki/Purpose" title="Purpose">purpose</a> attested by the cannon; because too he lends the sanction of the <a href="/wiki/Religion" title="Religion">religion</a> of the <a href="/wiki/Meek" class="mw-redirect" title="Meek">meek</a> to that which practically is the abrogation of everything but brute <a href="/wiki/Force" title="Force">Force</a>.</b> <ul><li>Ch. 24</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>At the penultimate moment, his words, his only ones, words wholly unobstructed in the utterance were these — "<a href="/wiki/God" title="God">God</a> <a href="/wiki/Bless" class="mw-redirect" title="Bless">bless</a> Captain Vere!" <ul><li>Ch. 25</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>The symmetry of form attainable in pure fiction can not so readily be achieved in a narration essentially having less to do with fable than with fact.</b> Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges... <ul><li>Ch. 28</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>But me they'll lash me in hammock, drop me deep.<br />Fathoms down, fathoms down, how I'll dream fast asleep.<br />I feel it stealing now. Sentry, are you there?<br />Just ease this darbies at the wrist, and roll me over fair,<br />I am sleepy, and the oozy weeds about me twist. <ul><li>Ch. 30, <i>Billy in the Darbies</i></li></ul></li></ul> <p><br /></p><div style="padding: .5em; border: 1px solid black; background-color: #FFE7CC;"> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Misattributed">Misattributed</h2><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=12" title="Edit section: Misattributed"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <ul><li>We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and along these fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. <ul><li>Though this statement and a few other variants of it have been widely attributed to Herman Melville, it is actually a paraphrase of one found in a sermon of <a href="/wiki/Henry_Melvill" title="Henry Melvill">Henry Melvill</a>, "Partaking in Other Men's Sins", St. Margaret's Church, Lothbury, England (12 June 1855), printed in <i>Golden Lectures</i> (1855) :</li></ul></li></ul> <dl><dd><dl><dd>There is not one of you whose actions do not operate on the actions of others—operate, we mean, in the way of example. He would be insignificant who could only destroy his own soul; but you are all, alas! of importance enough to help also to destroy the souls of others. ...<b>Ye cannot live for yourselves; a thousand fibres connect you with your fellow-men, and along those fibres, as along sympathetic threads, run your actions as causes, and return to you as effects.</b></dd></dl></dd></dl> </div> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Quotes_about_Melville">Quotes about Melville</h2><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=13" title="Edit section: Quotes about Melville"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:ArrowheadSign.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/40/ArrowheadSign.jpg/220px-ArrowheadSign.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="165" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/40/ArrowheadSign.jpg/330px-ArrowheadSign.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/40/ArrowheadSign.jpg/440px-ArrowheadSign.jpg 2x" data-file-width="2048" data-file-height="1536" /></a><figcaption>Melville, as he always does, began to reason of <a href="/wiki/Providence" title="Providence">Providence</a> and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human <a href="/wiki/Awareness" title="Awareness">ken</a>… ~ <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> </figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Sacred_Heart.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/37/Sacred_Heart.jpg/220px-Sacred_Heart.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="276" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/37/Sacred_Heart.jpg/330px-Sacred_Heart.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/37/Sacred_Heart.jpg/440px-Sacred_Heart.jpg 2x" data-file-width="510" data-file-height="640" /></a><figcaption>He has a very high and <a href="/wiki/Noble" class="mw-redirect" title="Noble">noble</a> <a href="/wiki/Nature" title="Nature">nature</a>, and better <a href="/wiki/Worth" title="Worth">worth</a> <a href="/wiki/Immortality" title="Immortality">immortality</a> than most of us. ~ <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a> </figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8b/Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg/220px-Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="346" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8b/Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg/330px-Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8b/Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg/440px-Moby_Dick_final_chase.jpg 2x" data-file-width="585" data-file-height="920" /></a><figcaption>Nobody had more <a href="/wiki/Nobility" title="Nobility">class</a> than Melville. To do what he did in <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i>, to tell a <a href="/wiki/Story" title="Story">story</a> and to <a href="/wiki/Risk" title="Risk">risk</a> putting so much material into it. If you could weigh a <a href="/wiki/Book" class="mw-redirect" title="Book">book</a>, I don’t <a href="/wiki/Know" class="mw-redirect" title="Know">know</a> any book that would be more full. … Melville took on the <a href="/wiki/Whole" class="mw-redirect" title="Whole">whole</a> <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>, saw it <a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">all</a> in a <a href="/wiki/Vision" title="Vision">vision</a>, and risked everything in <a href="/wiki/Prose" class="mw-redirect" title="Prose">prose</a> that <a href="/wiki/Sings" class="mw-redirect" title="Sings">sings</a>. You have a <a href="/wiki/Sense" class="mw-redirect" title="Sense">sense</a> from the very <a href="/wiki/Beginning" class="mw-redirect" title="Beginning">beginning</a> that Melville had <a href="/wiki/Revelation" title="Revelation">a vision</a> in his <a href="/wiki/Mind" title="Mind">mind</a> of what this book was going to look like, and he <a href="/wiki/Trusted" class="mw-redirect" title="Trusted">trusted</a> <a href="/wiki/Himself" class="mw-redirect" title="Himself">himself</a> to follow it through <a href="/wiki/Completeness" title="Completeness">all the way</a>. ~ <a href="/wiki/Ken_Kesey" title="Ken Kesey">Ken Kesey</a> </figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size mw-halign-right" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/84/Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg/220px-Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="165" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/84/Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg/330px-Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/84/Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg/440px-Herman_Melville_Headstone_1024.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1024" data-file-height="766" /></a><figcaption>Melville at his best invariably <a href="/wiki/Wrote" class="mw-redirect" title="Wrote">wrote</a> from a sort of <a href="/wiki/Dream" class="mw-redirect" title="Dream">dream</a><a href="/wiki/Self" title="Self">self</a>, so that events which he relates as actual <a href="/wiki/Fact" title="Fact">fact</a> have indeed a far deeper reference to his own <a href="/wiki/Soul" title="Soul">soul</a>, his own inner life. Melville was, at the core, a <a href="/wiki/Mysticism" title="Mysticism">mystic</a> and an <a href="/wiki/Idealist" class="mw-redirect" title="Idealist">idealist</a>. ~ <a href="/wiki/D._H._Lawrence" title="D. H. Lawrence">D. H. Lawrence</a> </figcaption></figure> <ul><li>under certain circumstances violence-acting without argument or speech and without counting the consequences-is the only way to set the scales of justice right again. (Billy Budd is the classical example.) In this sense, rage and the violence that sometimes-not always-goes with it belong among the "natural" human emotions, and to cure man of them would mean nothing less than to dehumanize or emasculate him. That such acts, in which men take the law into their own hands for justice's sake, are in conflict with the constitutions of civilized communities is undeniable; but their antipolitical character, so manifest in Melville's great story, does not mean that they are inhuman or "merely" emotional. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Hannah_Arendt" title="Hannah Arendt">Hannah Arendt</a> <i>Crises of the Republic</i> (1972)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Forty-four years ago, when his most famous tale, <i>Typee</i>, appeared, there was not a better known author than he, and he commanded his own prices.</b> Publishers sought him, and editors considered themselves fortunate to secure his name as a literary star. And to-day? Busy New York has no idea he is even alive, and one of the best-informed literary men in this country laughed recently at my statement that Herman Melville was his neighbor by only two city blocks. "Nonsense," said he. "Why, Melville is dead these many years!" Talk about literary fame? There's a sample of it! <ul><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bok" class="extiw" title="w:Edward Bok">Edward Bok</a>, on Melville's final decades of life in relative obscurity, in <i>Publishers' Weekly</i> (15 November 1890)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Most of the books published during the five-year period leading up to, during, and after the invasion of Mexico were war-mongering tracts. Euro-American settlers were nearly all literate, and this was the period of the foundational "American literature," with writers James Fenimore Cooper, Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, John Greenleaf Whittier, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville all active-each of whom remains read, revered, and studied in the twenty-first century, as national and nationalist writers, not as colonialists. Although some of the writers, like Melville and Longfellow, paid little attention to the war, most of the others either fiercely supported it or opposed it. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Roxanne_Dunbar-Ortiz" title="Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz">Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz</a>, <i>An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States</i> (2014)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>It was during the 1820s-the beginning of the era of Jacksonian settler democracy-that the unique US origin myth evolved reconciling rhetoric with reality. Novelist James Fenimore Cooper was among its initial scribes. Cooper's reinvention of the birth of the United States in his novel The Last of the Mohicans has become the official US origin story. Herman Melville called Cooper "our national novelist." <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Roxanne_Dunbar-Ortiz" title="Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz">Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz</a>, <i>An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States</i> (2014)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>On one meeting Melville showed <a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Hawthorne</a> a draft of <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i>. Hawthorne, himself currently completing <i><a href="/wiki/The_Scarlet_Letter" class="mw-redirect" title="The Scarlet Letter">The Scarlet Letter</a></i>, persuaded his friend to rework it from a tale of the high seas to an epic allegory that told not only a tale, but probed the defeats and triumphs of the human spirit.</b> Melville delayed his submission to his publishers until it could meet Hawthorne's exacting standards. When it did, Hawthorne at last pronounced that the tragic tale was "cooked in hellfire." <b>It was the praise Melville had sought.</b> <ul><li>Marlene Wagman-Geller, on some of the reasons for Melville's dedication of <i>Moby-Dick</i>: "<b>In Token of my admiration for his genius this book is inscribed to Nathaniel Hawthorne</b>", in <i>Once Again to Zelda : The Stories Behind Literature's Most Intriguing Dedications</i> (2008), p. 13</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Melville and I had a talk about time and eternity, things of this world and next, and books, and publishers, and all possible and impossible matters, that lasted pretty deep into the night. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a>, quoted in <i>Once Again to Zelda : The Stories Behind Literature's Most Intriguing Dedications</i> (2008), by Marlene Wagman-Geller, p. 13</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Melville, as he always does, began to reason of Providence and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human ken, and informed me that he "pretty much made up his mind to be annihilated"; but still he does not seem to rest in that anticipation; and, I think, will never rest until he gets hold of a definite belief.</b> It is strange how he persists — and has persisted ever since I knew him, and probably long before — in wandering to-and-fro over these deserts, as dismal and monotonous as the sand hills amid which we were sitting. <b>He can neither believe, nor be comfortable in his unbelief; and he is too honest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us.</b> <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne" title="Nathaniel Hawthorne">Nathaniel Hawthorne</a>, entry for 20 November 1856, in <i>The English Notebooks,</i> (1853 - 1858)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>A man with true, warm heart, and a soul and an intellect, — with life to his fingerprints; earnest, sincere, and reverent; very tender and modest. And I am not sure that he is not a very great man.</b> He has very keen perceptive power; but what astonishes me is, that his eyes are not large and deep. He seems to me to see everything accurately; and how he can do so with his small eyes, I cannot tell. They are not keen eyes, either, but quite undistinguished in any way. His nose is straight and handsome, his mouth expressive of sensibility and emotion. He is tall and erect, with an air free, brave, and manly. When conversing, he is full of gesture and force, and loses himself in his subject. There is no grace or polish. Once in a while, his animation gives place to a singularly quiet expression, out of those eyes to which I have objected; an indrawn, dim look, but which at the same time makes you feel that he is at that instant taking deepest note of what is before him. <b>It is a strange, lazy glance, but with a power in it quite unique. It does not seem to penetrate through you, but to take you into itself.</b> <ul><li><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophia_Hawthorne" class="extiw" title="w:Sophia Hawthorne">Sophia Hawthorne</a>, in a letter to her mother (1850), as quoted in <i>Herman Melville : Mariner and Mystic</i> (1921) by Raymond Melbourne Weaver, p. 24</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Nobody had more <a href="/wiki/Nobility" title="Nobility">class</a> than Melville.</b> To do what he did in <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i>, to tell a <a href="/wiki/Story" title="Story">story</a> and to <a href="/wiki/Risk" title="Risk">risk</a> putting so much material into it. If you could weigh a <a href="/wiki/Book" class="mw-redirect" title="Book">book</a>, I don’t <a href="/wiki/Know" class="mw-redirect" title="Know">know</a> any book that would be more full. It’s more full than <i><a href="/wiki/Leo_Tolstoy#War_and_Peace_.281865.E2.80.931869.29" title="Leo Tolstoy">War and Peace</a></i> or <i><a href="/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoevsky#The_Brothers_Karamazov_.281879.E2.80.931880.29" class="mw-redirect" title="Fyodor Dostoevsky">The Brothers Karamazov</a></i>. It has <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Elmo%27s_fire" class="extiw" title="w:St. Elmo's fire">Saint Elmo’s fire</a>, and <a href="/wiki/Great" class="mw-redirect" title="Great">great</a> <a href="/wiki/Whales" title="Whales">whales</a>, and grand <a href="/wiki/Arguments" class="mw-redirect" title="Arguments">arguments</a> between <a href="/wiki/Heroes" title="Heroes">heroes</a>, and <a href="/wiki/Secret" class="mw-redirect" title="Secret">secret</a> <a href="/wiki/Passions" title="Passions">passions</a>. It risks <a href="/wiki/Wandering" class="mw-redirect" title="Wandering">wandering</a> far, far out into <a href="/wiki/Earth" title="Earth">the globe</a>. <b>Melville took on the <a href="/wiki/Whole" class="mw-redirect" title="Whole">whole</a> <a href="/wiki/World" title="World">world</a>, saw it <a href="/wiki/All" class="mw-redirect" title="All">all</a> in a <a href="/wiki/Vision" title="Vision">vision</a>, and risked everything in <a href="/wiki/Prose" class="mw-redirect" title="Prose">prose</a> that <a href="/wiki/Sings" class="mw-redirect" title="Sings">sings</a>. You have a <a href="/wiki/Sense" class="mw-redirect" title="Sense">sense</a> from the very <a href="/wiki/Beginning" class="mw-redirect" title="Beginning">beginning</a> that Melville had <a href="/wiki/Revelation" title="Revelation">a vision</a> in his <a href="/wiki/Mind" title="Mind">mind</a> of what this book was going to look like, and he <a href="/wiki/Trusted" class="mw-redirect" title="Trusted">trusted</a> <a href="/wiki/Himself" class="mw-redirect" title="Himself">himself</a> to follow it through <a href="/wiki/Completeness" title="Completeness">all the way</a>.</b> <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Ken_Kesey" title="Ken Kesey">Ken Kesey</a>, interviewed in <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1830/the-art-of-fiction-no-136-ken-kesey">"Ken Kesey, The Art of Fiction No. 136" by Robert Faggen, in <i>The Paris Review</i> No. 130 (Spring 1994)</a></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>I was trying to describe a veteran of the Vietnam War, and I kept thinking of him as Billy Budd. I wondered, "Is this a correct comparison?" So I read it again today, and I realized that the book is about war. I didn't think about that before; I just thought it was about somebody good who was on a ship. I didn't remember the war. In those days they weren't drafted, they were impressed. The captain in the book even says, "Use the right word for it, it's impressment." Billy Budd is a draftee. And he goes along with it. The story is about mutiny within the military during wartime. <ul><li>1996 interview in <i>Conversations with <a href="/wiki/Maxine_Hong_Kingston" title="Maxine Hong Kingston">Maxine Hong Kingston</a></i> (1998)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>Herman Melville, whose work I loved <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Irena_Klepfisz" title="Irena Klepfisz">Irena Klepfisz</a> "Secular Jewish Identity: Yidishkayt in America" (1986) in <i>Dreams of an Insomniac</i> (1990)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>THE greatest seer and poet of the sea for me is Melville.</b> His vision is more real than <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swinburne" class="extiw" title="w:Swinburne">Swinburne's</a>, because he doesn't personify the sea, and far sounder than <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Conrad" class="extiw" title="w:Joseph Conrad">Joseph Conrad's</a>, because Melville doesn't sentimentalize the ocean and the sea's unfortunates. Melville at his best invariably wrote from a sort of dreamself, so that events which he relates as actual fact have indeed a far deeper reference to his own soul, his own inner life. <b>Melville was, at the core, a <a href="/wiki/Mysticism" title="Mysticism">mystic</a> and an idealist.</b> <ul><li><a href="/wiki/D._H._Lawrence" title="D. H. Lawrence">D. H. Lawrence</a> in <i><a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Studies_in_Classic_American_Literature/Chapter_10" class="extiw" title="wikisource:Studies in Classic American Literature/Chapter 10">Studies in Classic American Literature</a></i>.</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>if Herman Melville would have written "Moby Dick" in South Africa, it would be immediately taken for a fable about whites and blacks. In Latin America, they would read "Moby Dick" as a fable about macho and revolution. Some countries are probably doomed to have their literatures immediately interpreted in a general way. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Amos_Oz" title="Amos Oz">Amos Oz</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.npr.org/2019/01/04/682168487/remembering-israeli-author-and-peace-activist-amos-oz">interview with NPR</a> (1988)</li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li><b>Herman Melville is a god. … I cherish what he did. He was a genius.</b> Wrote <i><a href="/wiki/Moby-Dick" title="Moby-Dick">Moby-Dick</a></i>. Wrote <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre:_or,_The_Ambiguities" class="extiw" title="w:Pierre: or, The Ambiguities">Pierre</a></i>. Wrote <i><a href="/wiki/The_Confidence-Man" title="The Confidence-Man">The Confidence-Man</a></i>, wrote <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Budd" class="extiw" title="w:Billy Budd">Billy Budd</a></i>. … Oh, yes — look at him. … Scares the bejesus out of people and makes them hate him. Because he's so good. Claggart has him killed in that book. Claggart has his eye on that boy. He will not tolerate such goodness, such blondeness, such blue eye. <b>Goodness is scary.</b> It's like you want to knock it. You want to hit it. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Maurice_Sendak" title="Maurice Sendak">Maurice Sendak</a>, in an <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.pbs.org/now/arts/sendak.html">interview, "NOW with Bill Moyers", <i>PBS</i> (12 March 2004)</a></li></ul></li></ul> <ul><li>I've had my career. I've had my success. God willing, it should have happened to Herman Melville who deserved it a great deal more, you know? Imagine him being on <a href="/wiki/Bill_Moyers" title="Bill Moyers">Bill Moyers</a>' show. Nothing good happened to Herman Melville. <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Maurice_Sendak" title="Maurice Sendak">Maurice Sendak</a>, in an interview, "NOW with Bill Moyers", <i>PBS</i> (12 March 2004)</li></ul></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Editorial_eulogy_in_The_New_York_Times_(2_October_1891)"><span id="Editorial_eulogy_in_The_New_York_Times_.282_October_1891.29"></span>Editorial eulogy in <i>The New York Times</i> (2 October 1891)</h3><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=14" title="Edit section: Editorial eulogy in The New York Times (2 October 1891)"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <p>a few days after a brief obituary had appeared on 29 September 1891 </p> <ul><li><b>There has died and been buried in this city, during the current week, at an advanced age, a man who is so little known, even by name, to the generation now in the vigor of life that only one newspaper contained an obituary account of him, and this was but of three or four lines. Yet forty years ago the appearance of a new book by Herman Melville was esteemed a literary event, not only throughout his own country, but so far as the English-speaking race extended.</b> To the ponderous and quarterly British reviews of that time, the author of <i>Typee</i> was about the most interesting of literary Americans, and men who made few exceptions to the British rule of not reading an American book not only made Melville one of them, but paid him the further compliment of discussing him as an unquestionable literary force. Yet when a visiting British writer a few years ago inquired at a gathering in New-York of distinctly literary Americans what had become of Herman Melville, not only was there not one among them who was able to tell him, but there was scarcely one among them who had ever heard of the man concerning whom he inquired, albeit that man was then living within a half mile of the place of the conversation. Years ago the books by which Melville's reputation had been made had long been out of print and out of demand.</li></ul> <ul><li><b>In its kind this speedy oblivion by which a once famous man so long survived his fame is almost unique, and it is not easily explicable.</b> Of course, there are writings that attain a great vogue and then fall entirely out of regard or notice. But this is almost always because either the interest of the subject matter is temporary, and the writings are in the nature of journalism, or else the workmanship to which they owe their temporary success is itself the produce or the product of a passing fashion. This was not the case with Herman Melville. <b>Whoever, arrested for a moment by the tidings of the author's death, turns back now to the books that were so much read and so much talked about forty years ago has no difficulty in determining why they were then read and talked about. His difficulty will be rather to discover why they are read and talked about no longer.</b> The total eclipse now of what was then a literary luminary seems like a wanton caprice of fame. At all events, it conveys a moral that is both bitter and wholesome to the popular novelists of our own day.</li></ul> <ul><li><b>Melville was a born romancer.</b> One cannot account for the success of his early romances by saying that in the Great South Sea he had found and worked a new field for romance, since evidently it was not his experience in the South Sea that had led him to romance, but the irresistible attraction that romance had over him that led him to the South Sea. <b>He was able not only to feel but to interpret that charm, as it never had been interpreted before, as it never has been interpreted since.</b></li></ul> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="External_links">External links</h2><span class="mw-editsection"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">[</span><a href="/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&action=edit&section=15" title="Edit section: External links"><span>edit</span></a><span class="mw-editsection-bracket">]</span></span></div> <div class="noprint" style="clear: right; border: solid #aaa 1px; margin: 0 0 1em 1em; font-size: 90%; background: #f9f9f9; width: 250px; padding: 4px; spacing: 0px; text-align: left; float: right;"> <div style="float: left;"><figure class="mw-halign-none" typeof="mw:File"><a href="/wiki/File:Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg" class="mw-file-description" title="Wikipedia"><img alt="Wikipedia" src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg/50px-Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg.png" decoding="async" width="50" height="46" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg/75px-Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg.png 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg/100px-Wikipedia-logo-v2.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="103" data-file-height="94" /></a><figcaption>Wikipedia</figcaption></figure></div> <div style="margin-left: 60px;"><a href="/wiki/Wikipedia" title="Wikipedia">Wikipedia</a> has an article about: <div style="margin-left: 10px;"><i><b><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Melville" class="extiw" title="wikipedia:Herman Melville">Herman Melville</a></b></i></div> </div> </div> <div class="noprint" style="clear: right; border: solid #aaa 1px; margin: 0 0 1em 1em; font-size: 90%; background: #f9f9f9; width: 250px; padding: 4px; spacing: 0px; text-align: left; float: right;"> <div style="float: left;"><figure class="mw-halign-none" typeof="mw:File"><a href="/wiki/File:Wikisource-logo.svg" class="mw-file-description" title="Wikisource"><img alt="Wikisource" src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/50px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png" decoding="async" width="50" height="52" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/75px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/100px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="410" data-file-height="430" /></a><figcaption>Wikisource</figcaption></figure></div> <div style="margin-left: 60px;" class="vcard"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikisource" class="extiw" title="w:Wikisource">Wikisource</a> has original works by or about: <div style="margin-left: 10px;"><i><b><span class="fn"><a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Herman_Melville" class="extiw" title="s:Author:Herman Melville">Herman Melville</a></span></b></i></div> </div> </div> <div class="noprint" style="clear: right; border: solid #aaa 1px; margin: 0 0 1em 1em; font-size: 90%; background: #f9f9f9; width: 250px; padding: 4px; spacing: 0px; text-align: left; float: right;"> <div style="float: left;"><figure class="mw-halign-none" typeof="mw:File"><a href="/wiki/File:Commons-logo.svg" class="mw-file-description" title="Commons"><img alt="Commons" src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/50px-Commons-logo.svg.png" decoding="async" width="50" height="67" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/75px-Commons-logo.svg.png 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/100px-Commons-logo.svg.png 2x" data-file-width="1024" data-file-height="1376" /></a><figcaption>Commons</figcaption></figure></div> <div style="margin-left: 60px;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Commons" class="extiw" title="w:Wikimedia Commons">Wikimedia Commons</a> has media related to: <div style="margin-left: 10px;"><i><b><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Herman_Melville" class="extiw" title="commons:Category:Herman Melville">Herman Melville</a></b></i></div> </div> </div> <ul><li><span class="vcard"><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.gutenberg.org/author/Herman_Melville">Works by <span class="fn">Herman Melville</span></a> at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Gutenberg" class="extiw" title="w:Project Gutenberg">Project Gutenberg</a></span></li> <li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/melville.htm">Brief biography</a> at Kirjasto (Pegasos)</li> <li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/bb/bb_main.html">Online version of <i>Billy Budd</i></a> - Edited by David Padilla (University of Virginia)</li> <li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA96/atkins/cmmain.html">The Confidence-Man</a> (University of Virginia)</li></ul>    </div><noscript><img src="https://login.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:CentralAutoLogin/start?type=1x1&useformat=desktop" alt="" width="1" height="1" style="border: none; position: absolute;"></noscript> <div class="printfooter" data-nosnippet="">Retrieved from "<a dir="ltr" href="https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&oldid=3622226">https://en.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&oldid=3622226</a>"</div></div> <div id="catlinks" class="catlinks" data-mw="interface"><div id="mw-normal-catlinks" class="mw-normal-catlinks"><a href="/wiki/Special:Categories" title="Special:Categories">Categories</a>: <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Category:1819_births" title="Category:1819 births">1819 births</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:1891_deaths" title="Category:1891 deaths">1891 deaths</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Essayists_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Essayists from the United States">Essayists from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Humanists" title="Category:Humanists">Humanists</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Novelists_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Novelists from the United States">Novelists from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:People_from_New_York_City" title="Category:People from New York City">People from New York City</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Philosophical_pessimists" title="Category:Philosophical pessimists">Philosophical pessimists</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Poets_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Poets from the United States">Poets from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:19th-century_poets_from_the_United_States" title="Category:19th-century poets from the United States">19th-century poets from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Short_story_writers_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Short story writers from the United States">Short story writers from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Travel_writers" title="Category:Travel writers">Travel writers</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Educators_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Educators from the United States">Educators from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Sailors" title="Category:Sailors">Sailors</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Presbyterians_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Presbyterians from the United States">Presbyterians from the United States</a></li><li><a href="/wiki/Category:Unitarians_from_the_United_States" title="Category:Unitarians from the United States">Unitarians from the United States</a></li></ul></div></div> </div> </main> </div> <div class="mw-footer-container"> <footer id="footer" class="mw-footer" > <ul id="footer-info"> <li id="footer-info-lastmod"> This page was last edited on 24 November 2024, at 02:46.</li> <li id="footer-info-copyright">Text is available under the <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="//creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License</a>; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the <a class="external text" href="https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Policy:Terms_of_Use">Terms of Use</a> and <a class="external text" href="https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Policy:Privacy_policy">Privacy Policy.</a></li> </ul> <ul id="footer-places"> <li id="footer-places-privacy"><a href="https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Policy:Privacy_policy">Privacy policy</a></li> <li id="footer-places-about"><a href="/wiki/Wikiquote:About">About Wikiquote</a></li> <li id="footer-places-disclaimers"><a href="/wiki/Wikiquote:General_disclaimer">Disclaimers</a></li> <li id="footer-places-wm-codeofconduct"><a href="https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Policy:Universal_Code_of_Conduct">Code of Conduct</a></li> <li id="footer-places-developers"><a href="https://developer.wikimedia.org">Developers</a></li> <li id="footer-places-statslink"><a href="https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/en.wikiquote.org">Statistics</a></li> <li id="footer-places-cookiestatement"><a href="https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Policy:Cookie_statement">Cookie statement</a></li> <li id="footer-places-mobileview"><a href="//en.m.wikiquote.org/w/index.php?title=Herman_Melville&mobileaction=toggle_view_mobile" class="noprint stopMobileRedirectToggle">Mobile view</a></li> </ul> <ul id="footer-icons" class="noprint"> <li id="footer-copyrightico"><a href="https://wikimediafoundation.org/" class="cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--size-large cdx-button--fake-button--enabled"><img src="/static/images/footer/wikimedia-button.svg" width="84" height="29" alt="Wikimedia Foundation" loading="lazy"></a></li> <li id="footer-poweredbyico"><a href="https://www.mediawiki.org/" class="cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--size-large cdx-button--fake-button--enabled"><img src="/w/resources/assets/poweredby_mediawiki.svg" alt="Powered by MediaWiki" width="88" height="31" loading="lazy"></a></li> </ul> </footer> </div> </div> </div> <div class="vector-settings" id="p-dock-bottom"> <ul></ul> </div><script>(RLQ=window.RLQ||[]).push(function(){mw.config.set({"wgHostname":"mw-web.codfw.main-5857dfdcd6-ljctj","wgBackendResponseTime":138,"wgPageParseReport":{"limitreport":{"cputime":"0.112","walltime":"0.184","ppvisitednodes":{"value":401,"limit":1000000},"postexpandincludesize":{"value":2858,"limit":2097152},"templateargumentsize":{"value":302,"limit":2097152},"expansiondepth":{"value":5,"limit":100},"expensivefunctioncount":{"value":0,"limit":500},"unstrip-depth":{"value":0,"limit":20},"unstrip-size":{"value":0,"limit":5000000},"entityaccesscount":{"value":0,"limit":400},"timingprofile":["100.00% 18.373 1 -total"," 21.92% 4.028 1 Template:Wikipedia"," 17.47% 3.210 1 Template:Main"," 15.76% 2.896 1 Template:Gutenberg_author"," 12.45% 2.287 1 Template:Misattributed_end"," 11.08% 2.036 1 Template:Commonscat"," 10.64% 1.954 2 Template:Sisterproject"," 9.10% 1.672 1 Template:Misattributed_begin"," 8.98% 1.650 1 Template:Wikisource_author"]},"cachereport":{"origin":"mw-web.eqiad.main-5584645d7f-7cwkt","timestamp":"20241203010836","ttl":2592000,"transientcontent":false}}});});</script> <script type="application/ld+json">{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"Article","name":"Herman Melville","url":"https:\/\/en.wikiquote.org\/wiki\/Herman_Melville","sameAs":"http:\/\/www.wikidata.org\/entity\/Q4985","mainEntity":"http:\/\/www.wikidata.org\/entity\/Q4985","author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Contributors to Wikimedia projects"},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/www.wikimedia.org\/static\/images\/wmf-hor-googpub.png"}},"datePublished":"2003-11-03T17:22:49Z","dateModified":"2024-11-24T02:46:51Z","image":"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/1\/1d\/Herman_Melville_1860.jpg","headline":"American writer and poet (1819\u20131891)"}</script> </body> </html>