Melville

[Anonymous No.16731167]

What are his best works and what do you think of him in general?

[Anonymous No.16731181]

>>16731167
>what's his best work
Whatcha think OP?

[Anonymous No.16731191]

He's the Gaddis of the 19th Century.

[Anonymous No.16731203]

Have you heard of Moby Dick?

[Anonymous No.16731211]

>>16731203
No, whats it about?

[Anonymous No.16731221]

>>16731191
More like the Chad Bukowski

[Anonymous No.16731236]

>>16731167
>Best works
Moby dick is the only book he wrote.

[Anonymous No.16731245]

>>16731191
Melville isn't trash

[Anonymous No.16731273]

>>16731181
You tell me. I wanted some other answers than muh Moby Dick.
>>16731191
So a master?

[Anonymous No.16731287]

>>16731167
I've only read Moby Dick and Benito Cereno. Both were good, MD obviously better, and obviously more focused on. Heard he wrote BC for tobacco money.

[Anonymous No.16731446]

>>16731167
In general I think he was a sweet, thoroughly misunderstood man with very few friends although the equally removed Hawthorne was a good one. I think his best include Moby Dick, the four shorter pieces, Redburn, and Clarel. I do like Pierre (I thought it was hilarious) but Mardi not so much. Typee and Omoo are quick read travel accounts; the Confidence Man a taste, but enormously influential (one can detect the sound of it many books that come later in Am lit: Catcher in the Rye, for instance), and White Jacket's solid. Like Whitman's great prose, Melville's great poetry took me completely by surprise.

[Anonymous No.16731472]

>>16731167
irrelevant, didn't live a tough life

[Anonymous No.16731496]

>>16731472
What?
Return when you know what you're talking about. Your post is irrelevant

[Anonymous No.16731965]

>>16731167
Pierre is his masterpiece.

[Anonymous No.16731982]

>>16731965
Like Don Quixote destroyed the chivalric genre, Pierre did the same for romances.

[Anonymous No.16731990]

>>16731221
crack a pabst rib’, smoke a cig, take a shit

[Anonymous No.16732135]

>>16731191
the stupidest thing i've read all day

[Anonymous No.16732153]

>>16731167
Found out that he hated democracy
.... based

[Anonymous No.16732476]

>>16732153
Source? That would be quite based

[Anonymous No.16732514]

>>16732153
Nah, that's Plato

[Anonymous No.16732673]

>>16732476
>>16732514
https://www.poetrynook.com/poem/ungar-and-rolfe

[Anonymous No.16732702]

>>16731982
Agreed.

[Anonymous No.16733029]

>>16732673
"Debased into equality"

Based

[Anonymous No.16733036]

For me it's Clarel

[Anonymous No.16733038]

>>16732673
>>16733029
>" Yes, God is God, and men are men,
>Forever and for aye. What then?
>There's Circumstance — there's Time; and these
>Are charged with store of latencies
>Still working in to modify.
>For mystic text that you recall,
>Dilate upon, and e'en apply —
What the FUCK

[Anonymous No.16733044]

>>16731273
>You tell me. I wanted some other answers than muh Moby Dick.

Why? It's the correct answer. If you want his second best though, Bartleby The Scrivener

[Anonymous No.16733121]

>>16733044
Pleb answer: Moby Dick
Patrician answer: Pierre; or, The Ambiguities

[Anonymous No.16733124]

>>16733121
I haven't read either, which is worth reading first?

[Anonymous No.16733128]

>>16733124
Moby Dick

[Anonymous No.16733175]

>>16733128
I mean between Pierre and The Ambiguities

[Anonymous No.16733218]

>>16733175
It's the title. One book.

[Anonymous No.16733244]

>>16733218
Oh, guess I'm an idiot, thanks anon.

[Anonymous No.16733684]

>>16733175
>and
, or..

[Anonymous No.16734054]

>>16731167
Is he a one book wonder?

[Anonymous No.16734105]

>>16731273
>You tell me. I wanted some other answers than muh Moby Dick.
Why? It’s the correct answer for a reason, it’s his deepest, most well-constructed work by far. Clarel and his short stories (another anon already mentioned Bartleby, my favourite is paradise of bachelors/Tartarus of maids) are also great, his other novels are good of what I’ve read so far but nothing really compares to Moby-Dick, Pierre is probably the next best novel in quality and the one he write immediately after Moby-Dick and similar in theme, “the ambiguities” being the alternate title and ambiguity was the central theme of The Whale
>>16733121
Contrarianism is extremely gay, Pierre is not as profound as Moby-Dick and its parodic nature is not as strong a core than Moby-Dick’s encyclopaedic exploration of the search for meaning. A dissection of the romantic was important but not as important as the most profound work of American literature that is perhaps even more ambiguous than the ambiguities itself. I don’t want contrarianism to infect Melville discussion because it’s peak midwittery.
>>16731965
It’s good, maybe even great, but it’s not his masterpiece
>>16731472
>got stranded in the pacific with savages
>escaped from a south seas prison
>psychological anguish for most of his life
Melville had it tougher than most writers.

[Anonymous No.16734109]

>>16731167
>Melville
Didn't live a tough life.

[Anonymous No.16735268]

>>16734105
Moby Dick is too long

[Anonymous No.16735378]

>>16731167
his writing is good but he never made anything else on the same level as Moby Dick

[Anonymous No.16735636]

>>16731167
Pierre would be a second rate work of any other first rate author. Melville lucked out with Moby dick.

[Anonymous No.16735770]

>>16735636
Cringe

[Anonymous No.16735778]

>>16731472

[Anonymous No.16735848]

>>16735770
Cringe

[Anonymous No.16736886]

>>16734105
>encyclopedic exploration in search for meaning
That 'encyclopedic exploration' concerns only 'cetology' and is used to point Ahab's ridiculous, murderous obsession. In the end, knowledge is useless; passionate human stupidity rules the day and that's that.

[Anonymous No.16736940]

>>16734105
This.Contrarianism just creates a pointless circle where great works are dismissed and when they aren't popular, to be considered good again.Rinse and repeat.Moby Dick is one of the greatest novels ever written so I'm not going to knock Melville too hard for never creating another work in that vein.I personally hated The Confidence-Man.Billy Budd and Benito Cereno are okay.Bartleby is great.I enjoy a lot of his short stories.He just has a comfy vibe that few authors can match.I plan on reading Pierre in the next year but I'm setting my expectations low

[Anonymous No.16736951]

>>16736886
>encyclopedic exploration' concerns only 'cetology'
there are other diversions like about the ship and about whaling

[Anonymous No.16737362]

Moby Dick is my favorite novel and Bartleby, The Scrivener is one of the greatest short stories of all time.

[Anonymous No.16738803]

Most melville is excellent. One I find underrated is The Encantadas

[Anonymous No.16739194]

>>16735848
Cringe

[Anonymous No.16739466]

>>16736951
The means and the economic interest for there even being such an intensive study: somehow the quotation marks eluded you; it seemed easier to type 'cetology' than 'all things whales and whaling' --the point, however, stands: this obsession is meant to mirror Ahab's, and if the great white whale means anything btw it's you, whitey, and you'll note whitey 'wins'. The book is therefore also prophetic in that this analogue whale hunt is occurring, well, right now. Theory's monomania- diversity, difference -reflects Ahab's own for the great white whale almost too perfectly-- diverse from whom? Different from what? Who or what's the target?Precisely. Aar it bodes well for Islam that only Ishmael survives, although he too is white, like the wounded whale that swims on and on..
I like how McCarthy combines both whale and Ish in the Judge: Moby Dick become murderous Encyclopedia, a kind of evil Goethe upgrade!

[Anonymous No.16739809]

i think he´s the closest to an great artist america had

[Anonymous No.16739834]

>>16731167
DICK

[Anonymous No.16740251]

>>16739834
AHAAHHHAAAHAHA

[Anonymous No.16740447]

>>16738803
It's great, pure writing -- kind of a plotless Poe-like endeavour less the brooding supernature. Though you're right not many today have the patience for this.