Items related to Clarel (Hendricks House edition)
Synopsis
Who could possibly have foreseen that the author of “Typee” and “Omoo” would at last appear as the author of a poem of 18,000 lines, inspired by religious doubts, questions and aspirations? That Mr. Melville has a vein of native poetry in his nature was already manifested by some ballads which he published during the civil war; but it still remains an amazement that the hero of whaling and Polynesian adventures had become a theological mystic in his ripened years. The plot of Clarel has been constructed as a frame upon which to hang descriptions of the scenery of Palestine and the theological discussions of a chance company of tourists. The principal characters are an American student, an English clergyman, a Jew, a Smyrniote Greek and a Jewish girl of whom we see little, as she dies in order to introduce a tragic element. The poem is divided into four parts, respectively entitled: Jerusalem, The Wilderness, Mar Saba and Bethlehem.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
Melville, Herman, a noted American novelist and writer of travel and adventure; born at New York, August 1, 1819; died there, September 28, 1891. At the age of eighteen he shipped as a sailor before the mast, to Liverpool. Four years after he set out upon a whaling voyage in the South Pacific. On account of the abuse of the captain, he ran away from the ship at one of the Marquesas Islands. After many adventures, which he narrates in his "Typee," he made his escape on board a whaler. About 1850 he took up his residence at Pittsfield, Mass., but subsequently removed to New York, where he was appointed to a place in the Custom House. His works are "Typee, a Peep at Polynesian Life" (1846); "Omoo, a Narrative of Adventures in the South Seas" (1847); "Mardi, and a Voyage Thither" (1848); "Redburn" (1848); "White Jacket, or the World in a Man-of-War" (1850); "Pierre, or the Ambiguities " (1852); "Moby Dick, or the White Whale" (1851); "Israel Potter, His Fifty Years of Exile" (1855); "The Piazza Tales" (1856); "The Confidence Man" (1857); "Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War," a volume of poems (1866); "Clarel, a Pilgrimage in the Holy Land," a poem (1876); "John Marr and Other Sailors," a story (1888); and "Timoleon," poems (1891).
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
(No Available Copies)
Search Books: Create a WantCan't find the book you're looking for? We'll keep searching for you. If one of our booksellers adds it to AbeBooks, we'll let you know!
Create a Want
