In the sorrowful tragedy of Billy Budd, Sailor, the controlled rage of Benito Cereno and the tantalizing enigma of Bartleby, the Scrivener, Melville reveals himself as a singular storyteller of tremendous range.
Also including The Piazza Tales in full, this collection demonstrates why Melville stands among the greatest writers of the nineteenth century.
Reviewed by Pauline Melville in Slightly Foxed Issue 66.
Life among the Ledgers
PAULINE MELVILLE
But surely the paragon, the nonpareil of clerkdom and life among the ledgers is Herman Melville’s Bartleby the scrivener. (It is a com- plication for any writer to have the same surname as another more illustrious writer. I am often asked if I am related to Herman Melville. I am not. Although out of respect for my eminent namesake I have always refrained from writing a story about a big fish.) . . .
Extract from Slightly Foxed Issue 66, Summer 2020
Life among the Ledgers
I am rather fond of the crowd that Dante meets at the very start of his journey into Hell with Virgil. They are all rushing around moaning and shrieking on the edge of the River Acheron, hoping that...
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