Melville: Taipi

[Schiller]

I'm just reading Hermann Melville's Taipi and I think it's really a great novel. A very fascinating description of life in the Southern Sea with quite modern thoughts about the advantages and disadvantages of civilization.

I#m not very much into American literature and thought until now that Melville is just Moby Dick. Does anyone know if this novel is autobiographic. I mean did he really live for a while on such an island or is ist based on his experiences as a sailor?

I personally can only recommend this novel for reading. Are there more interesting works from Melville than Moby Dick and Taipi?

[azzageddi]

I know this is a really old post, but by coincidence I'm writing a paper on Typee right now. Anyway, yes, a lot of Melville's books are very interesting. Typee is one of my favorites, too. The sequel, Omoo, is not quite as good, kind of more of the same without some of the naivity that made Typee good. Mardi is a really wild fantasy that failed on the market (Typee and Omoo were Melville's most popular books during his life, by far), and after that he retreated to trying to repeat the Typee/Omoo formula in Redburn and White Jacket. And then comes the masterpiece (almost unread in his time), Moby Dick.

All of these first 6 books are based on his sea travels in his youth. All are at least partly fictional, though--Mardi and Moby Dick are the most fictional, while the others are a mix of half autobiography, half fiction. After that, most of his works are more purely fictional, although sometimes based on historical documents, like "Benito Cereno," a novella that I consider one of the best short works in American literature.

Never very successful as a writer, Melville just wrote poetry, mostly for himself, after the Civil War started. But one last sea book, Billy Budd, was found in his desk after he died.

[Babbalanja]

I know this is a really old post, but by coincidence I'm writing a paper on Typee right now. Anyway, yes, a lot of Melville's books are very interesting. Typee is one of my favorites, too. The sequel, Omoo, is not quite as good, kind of more of the same without some of the naivity that made Typee good. Mardi is a really wild fantasy that failed on the market (Typee and Omoo were Melville's most popular books during his life, by far), and after that he retreated to trying to repeat the Typee/Omoo formula in Redburn and White Jacket. And then comes the masterpiece (almost unread in his time), Moby Dick.

Hey, azzageddi! I read some of your posts on the B&N Moby-Dick board. You seem like a real Melville aficionado.

I recently read Typee, and I was impressed with how concise and efficient Melville's writing was. It's like listening to Mahler's first symphony, a work that shows how precise he could be before he went on to indulge his imagination.

And you mentioned you had read Mardi? You're the only other person I've come across who has read it. That wonderful novel doesn't deserve its obscurity.

Welcome to the board. I look forward to talking to you in the future.

[Virgil]

Whe Melville is on the mark, like in Typee and Moby Dick, he really is a fine writer. Among the upper eschalon of the best ever. Also recommend many of his short stories.

[azzageddi]

Hey, azzageddi! I read some of your posts on the B&N Moby-Dick board. You seem like a real Melville aficionado.

Thanks very much for your kind welcome. However, unless I was posting in my sleep (possible--I've been known to stumble across a forum post while researching, join the forum and post a reply, and then forget about it), I think that must be another Azzageddi. I'm surprised to find that there is someone else on the web who goes by that handle. I'm also quite happy to see that there is a Babbalanja!

And you mentioned you had read Mardi? You're the only other person I've come across who has read it. That wonderful novel doesn't deserve its obscurity.

I have to agree with most critics that, taken as a whole, it is an inferior work of Melville's--a great deal of dross, but oh such veins of gold running through it! It's certainly worth exploring. Moby Dick is far more consistently good, but I wouldn't have missed Babbalanja's "Azzageddi moments" for the world.

I'm actually revising a paper I presented last year, on Babbalanja's use of rhetorical masks in Mardi.

[Chap]

Such great comments in this thread--here's the thing: If I had read Mardi first, I would not have read much more. As it happened, I read Typee first. That made me read Redburn, White Jacket, Omoo, Moby Dick, Confidence Man, Pierre, and Mardi and others. As you move through the catalog, you find yourself overlooking the shortcomings of the writing to get the real nuggets. Mardi is great, but I am glad I read it late.