Melville's city : literary and urban form in nineteenth-century New York / Wyn Kelley.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kelley, Wyn.

Series:

Cambridge studies in American lietrature and culture.

Cambridge studies in American lietrature and culture

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891--Knowledge and learning--City and town life.

Melville, Herman.

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891.

National Book Committee.

City and town life.

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891--Knowledge and learning--New York (State)--New York.

New York (State)--New York.

New York (N.Y.)--Intellectual life--19th century.

New York (N.Y.).

Intellectual life.

City and town life in literature.

Cities and towns in literature.

New York (N.Y.)--In literature.

Literary form.

Physical Description:

xiv, 312 pages : map ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

New York : Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Summary:

Melville's City argues that Melville's relationship to the city was considerably more complex than has generally been believed. By placing him in the historical and cultural context of nineteenth-century New York, Kelley presents a Melville who borrowed from the colorful cultural variety of the city while at the same time investigating its darker and more dangerous social aspects. She shows that images both from Melville and from popular sources of the time represented New York variously as Capital, Labyrinth, City of Man, and City of God, and she goes on to demonstrate that he resisted a generalizing or totalizing representation of the city by revealing its hybrid identity and giving voice to the poor, the displaced, and the racially excluded. Through close examination of works spanning Melville's career, she forges a new analysis of the connections between urban and literary form.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0521560543

OCLC:

33132375