Melville in love : the secret life of Herman Melville and the muse of Moby-Dick / Michael Shelden.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Shelden, Michael, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891.

Melville, Herman.

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891--Relations with women.

Morewood, Sarah Huyler, 1823-1863.

Morewood, Sarah Huyler.

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891. Moby Dick--Sources.

Novelists, American--19th century--Biography.

Novelists, American.

Relations with women.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

271 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, map ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, [2016]

Summary:

Herman Melville's epic novel Moby-Dick was a spectacular failure when it was first published in 1851, effectively ending its author's rise to literary fame. He never recovered from the setback, and because he did not make much effort to preserve his legacy, we know very little about him, and even less about what he called his "wicked book." Now, Pulitzer Prize finalist Michael Shelden sheds light on this literary mystery to tell the story of Melville's passionate, obsessive, and clandestine affair with a married woman named Sarah Morewood, whose libertine impulses encouraged and sustained Melville's own. In his research, Shelden discovered unexplored documents suggesting that, in their shared resistance to the "iron rule" of social conformity, Sarah and Melville had forged an illicit and enduring romantic and intellectual bond. Emboldened by the thrill of courting Sarah in secret, the pleasure of falling in love, and the excitement of spending time with literary luminaries like Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes and Nathaniel Hawthorne, Melville found the courage to take the leap from light works of adventure to the hugely brilliant, utterly subversive Moby-Dick.--Adapted from dust jacket.

Contents:

Pt. I, A sailor in the Berkshires

Pt. II, Greylock's majesty

Pt. III, The voyage out.

Part I: A sailor in the Berkshires. A summer place ; "Corset, skirts, or crinoline" ; The judge's daughter ; The first step ; The young Turk ; The doctor's report ; The scarlet essay ; "Holy influences"

Part II: Greylock's majesty. Leviathan ; Reveries ; Black quake ; The vortex ; The elusive neighbor ; To Greylock ; Lot's wife ; All for love ; Harvest ; Sons and lovers

Part III: The voyage out. "Steel, flint & asbestos" ; The countess ; Rough passage ; Aspects of the war ; Home front ; Letting go ; The hanging.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 251-271).

ISBN:

9780062418982

006241898X

OCLC:

922910332