美国文学Herman Melville

Herman Melville麦尔维尔(1819—1891)Herman Melville1. Three important things in his life:* Going out to seaHis experiences and adventures on the sea furnished him with abundant material for his fiction writings, especially his masterpiece Moby Dick2) His marriageIn the history of American literature there were two authors had similar marriages. Melville and Scott Fitzgerald, both married above them and had to do hackwork（纯粹为糊口而写的东西，庸俗作品）for the money they needed to keep their wives in their extravagant style.3)His friendship with HawthorneDuring the summer of 1890 Melville and Hawthorne met and became good friends.They shared similar ideas and opinions on most kinds of fields.Especially against the background of Transcendental optimism, Melville agrees with Hawthorne’s Blackness --- the evil at the core of life. “Evil in life and the human soul help make life and man better”“To scale great heights, we must come out of the lowest depths. The way to heaven is through hell. We need fiery baptism in the fierce flame of our bosoms.”凤凰涅槃浴火重生• The original design of Moby Dick was just a text on the whale fishery.When Melville met Hawthorne, he had completed one third of Moby Dick. Without Hawthorne, Melville would have just written it about whaling hunting.With the influence of Hawthorne, Melville rewrote it into a world classic with a mixture of:游记、航海故事、寓言、捕鲸传说、有关鲸鱼与捕鲸业的百科全书、美国史诗、莎士比亚式的悲剧、抒情散文长诗、塞万提斯式的浪漫体小In Token of my admiration for his genius, this book is inscribed to NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.2. Melville’s Major Works1) Novels(1)Polynsie Trilogy “波里尼西亚三部曲” from his adventures among the people of the South Pacific islandsTypee 1846«泰皮»Omoo 1847«欧穆»Mardi1849«玛地»(2) Redburn 1849 «雷得本» an account of his voyage to England(3) White Jacket 1850 «白外衣»his life on a United States man-of-war军舰(4) Pierre《皮埃尔》 (1852):A darkly allegorical exploration of the nature of evil, which is psychologically complex and elaborate.(5) Israel Potter《伊斯雷尔·波特》 (1855):A historical romance(6) The Confidence Man《骗子的化装表演》(1857):Satirizes the selfishness and commercialism of Melville’s time.(7) Billy Budd《比利•巴德》(1891)A novella about a young sailor, personifying innocence, doomed by the malevolent hatred of a ship’s officer, personifying evil.2) Short storiesThe Piazza Tales《广场故事》(1856):Contains some of Melville’s finest shorter works(1) Bartleby, the Scrivener书记员巴特尔比The story of Bartlebyis simply about a manlosing his will to live.Subtitled, "A Story of Wall Street”, it is set in the business world of 19th-century New York.Bartleby, a scrivener was good at the copying part of his job, but when asked to proofread aloud one day he simply replied, "I prefer not to." From that moment forward, he used the phrase "I prefer not to" for every task requested of him, eventually "preferring not to" do any work whatsoever.Bartleby chose to rebel and become an anti-hero. It is intended to show the reader a dark side in all of us when the meaning of our existence is allowed to be challenged."Bartleby, the Scrivener" reflects Melville's own pessimism at the time. (2) Benito Cereno 《贝尼托·塞莱诺》The story centers on a slave rebellion on board a Spanish merchant ship in 1799.Earlier critics regarded Benito Cereno as a tale that primarily explores human depravity .It is regarded by many as Melville's finest short story.3) Poetry:(1) Battle-Pieces and the Aspects of War《战事集》(1866)(2) Clarel 《克拉瑞尔》 (1876)Melville’s Masterpiece Moby-Dick«白鲸»，«莫比•狄克»an encyclopedia of everything: history, philosophy, religion, the whaling industrya Shakespearean tragedy of man fighting against fates in an indifferent and hostile world.Moby-Dick---“the world’s greatest sea novel”, compound of search, pursuit, conflict, and catastrophe.1. PlotThe novel’s plot is built on one conflict---Ahab vs. the WhaleIt is essentially the story of Ahab and his quest to defeat Moby Dick, for this white whale took Ahab’s leg.• Ishmael伊什梅尔, feeling depressed, seeks escape by going out to sea on the whaling ship, Peqoud裴廓德号.The captain is Ahab亚哈, the man with one leg.•• Moby Dick, the white whale, had sheared off Ahab’s leg on a previous voyage, and Ahab resolves to hunt him.• The ship makes a good catch of whales but Ahab refuses to turn back until he has killed his enemy.• Eventually, the whale appears, and the Peqoud begins its doomed fight with it.• On the third day, the whale carries the Peqoud along with it to its doom.• All on board the whaler get drowned, except one, Ishmael,who survives to tell the tale.2. Characters• Ishmael伊什梅尔/以实玛利• The narrator of the story• Name: the first son of Abraham (from The Bible) symbol of orphans, exiles,wanderers and social outcasts,etc.starts out feeling badhopes to find an ideal lifecomes to see the folly of Ahab seeking to conquer naturefeels the significance of love and companionshiplearns to accept,an attitude which ensures his survival2) Ahab 亚哈• Name: Ahab, King of Israel (from The Bible， a tyrant) symbol of evil • The tyrannical captain of the PequodAhab has the qualities of a tragic hero – a great heart and a fatal flaw.•Melville portrayed Ahab an Emersonian self-reliant individual.But he is too much of self-reliance.For him, the only law is his own will;To him the world exists for his sake;He may do what he wills:lives may be sacrificedand nature may havebeen vanquished.His too much self-reliance leads to death—physical, spiritual, emotional, at the expense of all else.His tragedy stems from his extreme individualism or solipsism(唯我论). Moby Dick– a negative reflection upon Transcendentalism3. Symbols in Moby Dick1) The ship – Pequod and the voyage2) Moby Dick3) Ahab4) Queequeg’s Coffin1) The Pequod and the voyage(1) a symbol of doom 必遭毁灭的命运named after a Native American tribe in Massachusettsdid not long survive the arrival of white men (extincted)is painted gloomy black and covered in whale teeth and bones(2) the Pequod -the ship of the American soul象征执著探寻自然界秘密的美国精神the voyage - search and discovery, the search for the ultimate truth of experience/象征探索与发现的心灵历程2) Moby DickThe white whale is capable of many interpretations.For he is a mixture of evil and goodness:“paradoxically benign (kind and gentle) and malevolent (malicious and wicked),nourishing (providing sth good) and destructive,”“massive, brutal, monolithic(massive), but at the same time protean(changeable), erotically beautiful, infinitely variable.”various symbolic meanings to different peopeto the pequod’s crew--一只时而平静安详,时而恐怖暴虐的海怪a concept onto which they can displace their anxiety about dangerous and frightening jobsto Ahab---A symbol of evil邪恶与恐怖、难以征服而又必须予以摧毁的仇敌a manifestation of all that is wrong with the worldTo IshmaelMoby-dick is the embodiment of the mysterious nature or universea metaphor for the human relationship with God: God is unkown and cannot be pinned down(force)Paradoxical whiteness: Death and corruption Purity and innocenceA symbol of evilA symbol of goodnessA symbol of both白鲸既代表高洁安宁,也代表恐怖死亡,它是宇宙间一切对立矛盾的结合4).Queequeg’s Coffin• Queequeg’s coffin alternately symbolizes life and death.• Queequeg has it built when he is seriously ill, but when he recovers, it becomes a chest to hold his belongings and an emblem of his will to live.• He perpetuates the knowledge tattooed on his body by carving it onto the coffin’s lid.• The coffin further comes to symbolize life when it replaces the Pequod’s life buoy.• When the Pequod sinks, the coffin becomes Ishmael’s buoy(浮标), saving not only his life but the life of the narrative that he will pass on.4. Themes of Moby Dick1) Melville's bleak view (negative attitude): the sense of futility andmeaninglessness of the world.His attitude to life is “Everlasting Nay”• Man in this universe lives a meaningless and futile life, meaningless because futile (having no useful results徒劳的).• Man cannot overcome nature. Once he attempts to seek power over it he is doomed.• Man must place himself at the mercy of nature.• The idea that man can make the world for himself is nothing but a transcendentalist folly.the adventure of killing Moby Dick is meaningless.Ahab tries to control it, which leads to his doom.the loss of faith, the sense of futility2) alienation (far away from each other)exists between man and man, man and society, and man and nature.Ahab cuts himself off from his family, stays away from his crew, hates Moby Dick and becomes a devil rushing to his doom.He was within “the masoned石瓦匠, walled town of a captian’s exclusiveness”,which leads him to his doom.3) loneliness and suicidal individualism (individualism causing disaster and death)Ahab: too much of a self-reliant individual to be a good human beinga victim of extreme individualismThe price of self-reliance is death.Moby Dick is a negative reflection upon Transcendentalism4）rejection and questVoyaging for Ishmael has become a journey in quest of knowledge and values.starts out feeling badhopes to find an ideal lifecomes to see the folly of Ahab seeking to conquer naturefeels the significance of love and companionshiplearns to accept,an attitude which ensures his survivalRevival of Moby DickBorn in the 19th century, Melville didn’t receive recognition until the 20th century.Moby-Dick best illustrates the loss of faith, and sense of futility and meaninglessness which characerize the modern life of the west so that the twentith century has found it both fascinating and great.5. Writing styles of Melville1) His works are symbolic and metaphorical.voyage- "search and discovery, the search for the ultimate truth of experience."the Pequod -the ship of the American soulMoby Dick---a symbol ofits whiteness--- paradoxical color(2)He manages to achieve the effect of ambiguity through employing the technique of multiple view of his narratives.Moby Dick is portrayed for the reader from different angles.The author is unwillingness to commit himself, and the reader is thrown upon himself for judgment.(3) He tends to write periodic chapters (掉尾章的手法).掉尾句是主句在最后出现的一种复合句the last paragraph of chapter one pulling all things into one sentence is a good illustration in point.Chapter one Loomings 幻影重重/海市蜃楼。