The Literature Network - Melville's Benito Cereno.(Herman Melville)

Melville's Benito Cereno.(Herman Melville)

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From: The Explicator
Date: 20050322
Author:Manheim, Dan

Critics have long recognized Herman Melville's novella Benito Cereno (1) as a text that can be read, in the words of James Kavanagh, "as a discourse about discourse"--about how language shapes experiences and events (131). (2) A concern with questionable narrative authority appears throughout the story, centering on the erroneous stories that Captain Amasa Delano tells himself to explain the events that take place aboard the San Dominick. By interpreting the evidence before him, Captain Delano constructs a coherent narrative of events, but it is Babo, of course, who exploits the ...

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