Melville as poet : the art of "pulsed life" / edited by Sanford E. Marovitz.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Marovitz, Sanford E.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Melville, Herman, 1819-1891--Criticism and interpretation.

Melville, Herman.

Authors, American.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (256 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Kent, Ohio : Kent State University Press, 2013.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Herman Melville's literary reputation is based chiefly on his fiction, especially Moby-Dick and Billy Budd. Yet he was a gifted poet, as evidenced by his collection of Civil War poems, Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War (1866), and by his epic-length poem, Clarel (1876), a symbolic rendering of his pilgrimage of 1856-57 to the Holy Land, as well as the two small volumes of poems he published before his death in 1891. Melville as Poet: The Art of "Pulsed Life" opens with an introduction by Sanford E. Marovitz and the late Douglas Robillard on Melville's conception of poetry as a literary form. The essays begin with Dennis Berthold's study of how Melville's observations of art at New York's National Academy of Design in 1865 are reflected in Battle-Pieces, and Mary K. Bercaw Edwards follows, describing how the nautical combat of the ironclads Monitor and Merrimack became a subject of wide contemporary interest in popular culture. The next three essays focus on Clarel. Peter Riley explains how Melville's familiarity with the congestion of Lower Manhattan as a customs inspector influenced his descriptions of Jerusalem. Gordon M. Poole then discusses notable subtleties in Ruggero Bianchi's Italian translation of the poem, and Robert R. Wallace reveals how selected Biblical prints and other graphics familiar to Melville affected the poet's descriptions in Clarel. Melville's John Marr and Other Sailors (1888) is then examined by A. Robert Lee, who emphasizes the themes of memory and death in that small volume, and Sanford E. Marovitz illuminates Melville's method of unifying Timoleon, Etc. by using contrast to bind, not separate. Vernon Shetley compares Melville's "Pausilippo" thematically with Shelley's "Julian and Maddalo," and Michael Jonik explores "The Archipelago" for insights into Melville's experimentation with imagery and form. Finally, Wyn Kelley, Clark Davis, and Robert Sandberg imaginatively examine and reassess poems Melville left unpublished at his death. Melville as Poet is a valuable collection of new and critical scholarship that aims to encourage more and deeper study of Melville's art of poetry.

Contents:

""Cover""; ""Copyright""; ""Dedication""; ""Contents""; ""Foreword""; ""Acknowledgments""; ""Introduction""; ""Pictorial Intertexts for Battle-Pieces: Melville at the National Academy of Design, 1865""; ""Recontextualizing Melville�s: Monitor Poems""; ""Melville�s Biblical Prints and Clarel""; ""Urban and Metrical Forms in Clarel""; ""Clarel in Italy, Italy in Clarel: From Poem to Poema""; ""A Picture Stamped in Memory�s Mint: John Marr and Other Sailors""; ""Connecting by Contrast: The “Art� of Timoleon, Etc.""

""A Failure to Communicate: Shelley�s “Julian and Maddalo� and Melville�s “Pausilippo�""""“Isles of Absentees�: The Form of the Archipelago in Melville�s Writing""; ""“Free Robe and Vest�: Melville�s Uncollected Verse""; ""Melville and the Poetics of Ventriloquism: Giving Voice “At the Hostelry�""; ""Literary Reprises: Rhetorical Staging and Dramatic Performance in Melville�s Prose-and-Verse Writings""; ""Contributors""; ""Index""

Notes:

Includes index.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-61277-707-4

OCLC:

868286510