Herman Melville Mariner And Mystic

Devil's Advocate, Ghosts, Parents and Early Years, A Substitute for Pistol and Ball, Discoveries on Two Continents, Pedagogy, Pugilism and Letters, Blubber and Mysticism, Leviathan, The Pacific, Man-Eating Epicures—The Marquesas, Mutiny and Missionaries—Tahiti, On Board a Man-of-War, to the Racing Tide, Across the Atlantic Again, Neighbour of Hawthorne's, The Great Refusal, The Long Quietus, Bibliography

Raymond Melbourne Weaver (1888-April 4, 1948) was a professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University in 1916-1948, and a literary scholar best known for publishing Herman Melville: Mariner and Mystic, the first full biography of American author Herman Melville (1819-1891) in 1921 and editing Melville's works. Weaver's scholarly credentials, training, and persuasiveness were important in launching the "Melville Revival" of the 1920s that brought Melville from obscurity to wide recognition. Weaver was an influential teacher. He published a novel, wrote introductions for editions of American fiction, book reviews, and literary essays, but never published another scholarly book after his book on Melville.Herman Melville: Mariner and Mystic (1921) was the first full-length study of Melville. Weaver presents Melville as a disappointed and disillusioned genius who rebelled against social convention and paid the price: "His whole history is the record of an attempt to escape from an inexorable and intolerable world of reality." Weaver praises Melville for establishing the South Seas as a suitable topic for literature and for his depictions of a sailor's sea-life, but saved his highest praise for Moby-Dick, Melville's "undoubted masterpiece." But Weaver saw the cold reception from critics as leading to the "Long Quietus," that is, Melville's withdrawal from engagement with literature. He characterized Melville's work after 1851 as inferior, sometimes even unacceptable. The warm reception and wide circulation of Weaver's biography made it a prime source for later biographers who were not always aware that, in the words of a recent Melville scholar, "it is often inaccurate in its details and too dependent on Melville's travel narratives for autobiographical reference and documentation." Later scholars also hold Weaver partly responsible for the idea that Melville withdrew from literature; it is now more widely held that he turned to poetry, a genre in which he is now recognized as a leader.

In this first full-length study of Melville published in 1921, Weaver presents his subject as a disappointed and disillusioned genius who rebelled against social convention and paid the price.

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Excerpt from Herman Melville Mariner and Mystic "If ever, my dear Hawthorne," wrote Melville in the summer of 1851, "we shall sit down in Paradise in some little shady corner by ourselves; and if we shall by any means be able to smuggle a basket of champagne there (I won't believe in a Temperance Heaven); and if we shall then cross our celestial legs in the celestial grass that is forever tropical, and strike our glasses and our heads together till both ring musically in concert: then, O my dear fellow mortal, how shall we pleasantly discourse of all the things manifold which now so much distress us." This serene and laughing desolation - a mood which in Melville alternated with a deepening and less tranquil despair - is a spectacle to inspire with sardonic optimism those who gloat over the vanity of human wishes. For though at that time Melville was only thirty-two years old, he had crowded into that brief space of life a scope of experience to rival Ulysses', and a literary achievement of a magnitude and variety to merit all but the highest fame. Still did he luxuriate in tribulation. Well-born, and nurtured in good manners and a cosmopolitan tradition, he was, like George Borrow, and Sir Richard Burton, a gentleman adventurer in the barbarous out posts of human experience. Nor was his a kid-gloved and ex pensively staged dip into studio savagery. "For my part, I abominate all honourable respectable toils, trials, and tribulations of every kind whatsoever," he declared. And as proof of this abomination he went forth penniless as a common sailor to view the watery world. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

To Professor Carl Van Doren, to Miss Cora Pa-get, and to Mrs. Eleanor Melville Metcalf, I am, in the writing of this book, very especially indebted. By Professor Van Doren‟s enthusiasm and schol-arship I was instigated to a study of Melville. It has been my privilege to enjoy Miss Paget‟s very valuable criticism and assistance throughout the preparation of this volume. Mrs. Metcalf gave me access to all the surviving records of her grandfa-ther: Melville manuscripts, letters, journals, anno-tated books, photographs, and a variety of other material. But she did far more. My indebtedness to Mrs. Metcalf‟s vivid interest, her shrewd in-sight, her keen sympathy can be stated only in superlatives. To Mrs. and Mr. Metcalf I owe one of the richest and most pleasant associations of my life.