[Emerson, Mary Moody] Phyllis Cole,
MARY MOODY EMERSON AND THE ORIGINS OF TRANSCENDENTALISM: A Family History.
NEW copy, trade PAPERBACK. (NY: Oxford University Press, 2002).
370 pages.
~~~ "In this magisterial work of feminist archaeology, Phyllis Cole recovers Mary Moody Emerson’s life in the contexts of late New England Calvinism, the Emerson family, women’s opportunities in the early republic and Mary’s own crusty personality."
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[Emerson, Ralph Waldo] Hodder, Alan D.,
EMERSON'S RHETORIC OF REVELATION:
Nature, the Reader, and the Apocalypse Within.
Pennsylvania State University Press. 1989, NEW copy. Hardcover with dust jacket. Notes, index, 170 pages. Emerson's Nature and its links with the Christian Bible, specifically the Book of Revelation. OUT OF PRINT.
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[Emerson, Ralph Waldo] Robert D. Richardson, Jr.,
EMERSON: The Mind on Fire.
NF/NF. Hardcover with dust jacket. A nice, clean copy, with jacket in mylar.
With a frontispiece by Barry Moser. University of California Press, 1995. First Edition. Engravings, photographs, genealogies, chronology, principal sources, notes, index, 671 pages. ~~~ From Publishers Weekly: "The maverick intellectual life of Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82) is the focus of this imposing, highly erudite biography. In 1832, Emerson resigned his Boston ministry to pursue a career as an essayist, orator and poet, delivering more than 1500 lectures in his lifetime, including `The American Scholar' (1837), and publishing essays such as 'Nature' (1836) and 'Representative Men' (1850). As America's foremost prophet of individual experience, he was also a founder of the Transcendentalist Club, editor of the transcendentalist magazine, The Dial, and spokesman for many reformist causes. Drawing on unpublished personal journals, correspondence and lectures, Richardson (Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind) charts, in exacting detail, the minutia of Emerson's daily life in Concord, Mass., and extensive travels; the literature and philosophy he read over several decades and how his reading shaped his steadily evolving intellect. Although the nuances of Emerson's personality are eclipsed by textual analysis, Richardson balances the often chilling puritanism of Emerson's writing with a portrait of the man as hungry for friendship, maintaining close relationships with Carlisle, Thoreau, Bronson Alcott and Margaret Fuller; and whose icy doctrine of individualism reflects the loneliness caused by the premature deaths of his beloved first wife, his two younger brothers and numerous friends."
~~~~ From
Library Journal: "Using freshly available materials on Emerson, Richardson here fashions a lively intellectual biography of the 'sage of Concord.' In exacting detail, the author traces the development of Emerson's great imagination from his early student days at Harvard to his later associations with Coleridge and Carlyle. Through a study of Emerson's wide-ranging reading, Richardson reveals the origins of key Emersonian doctrines such as self-reliance, the transcendence of the soul, and the mind as an ever-erupting volcano. The great value of the biography lies in its exploration of the influences of Coleridge, Goethe, Madame de Stal, and Hindu thought on Emerson. While the intimate detail in which Emerson's life is examined is reminiscent of the pedantry of much late 19th-century American biography, Richardson offers a captivating account of the originality, creativity, and genius of the American Coleridge. This biography goes beyond John Mc-Aleer's Emerson: Days of Encounter.
~~~~ From
BookList: "Unlike Thoreau, Emerson never built a cabin on the shores of Walden Pond. But Richardson shows how Emerson's volcanic genius ignited flames of kindred enthusiasm in Thoreau, Whitman, Fuller, and other gifted Americans. Careful analysis of his vast reading reveals how Emerson drew inspiration from the world's classic literature yet maintained a fierce self-reliance that still defines one of the primary themes of our national culture. As in his biography of Thoreau, Richardson focuses principally on his subject's inner life, the life of his mind and spirit. But in this subtle portrayal of Emerson the thinker, the reader also sees the clearly limned portrait of Emerson the social activist, outraged by slavery and by oppressive Indian policies. Nor is the focus so narrowly cerebral that the reader does not feel the personal tragedy in the deaths of Emerson's first wife and son. Indeed, by referring to many previously unavailable private letters and manuscripts, Richardson sheds light on both Emerson's emotions and his intellect. A masterful work, this biography will attract the attention of scholars and serious general readers for decades."
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Fresonke, Kris,
WEST OF EMERSON: The Design of Manifest Destiny.
NEW copy, trade PAPERBACK. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002).
Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index, 213 pages.
~~~ Where did American literature start? The familiar
story of Emerson and Thoreau has them setting up shop in
Concord, Massachusetts, and determining the course of
American writing. West of Emerson overhauls this
story of origins as it shifts the context for these literary
giants from the civilized East to the wide-open spaces of the
Louisiana Purchase. Kris Fresonke tracks down the texts by
explorers of the far West that informed Nature,
Emerson's most famous essay, and proceeds to uncover the
parodic Western politics at play in classic New England works
of Romanticism. Westerns, this book shows, helped create
"Easterns." ~~~ West of Emerson roughs up genteel
literary history: Fresonke argues for a fresh mix of American
literature, one based on the far reaches of American territory
and American literary endeavor. Reading into the record the
unexplored writings of Lewis and Clark, Zebulon Pike, Stephen
Long, and William Emory, Fresonke forges surprising
connections between the American West and the American
visions emanating from the neighborhood of Walden Pond.
These connections open a new view of the politics--and, by
way of the notion of "design," the theological lineage--of
manifest destiny. Finally, Fresonke's book shows how the cast
of the American canon, no less than the direction of American
politics, came to depend on what design one placed on the
continent.
CONTENTS:List of
Illustrations / Acknowledgments / Introduction /
1. Natural Causes: The
Journals of Lewis and Clark ~~~ 2. Zebulon Pike, Federalist Gloom, and
Western Lands ~~~ 3. The Land without Qualities: Stephen Long and William
Emory ~~~ 4. Emerson's 1830s ~~~ 5. Emerson's Nature: West of Ecstasy ~~~ 6.
Thoreau and the Design of Dissent ~~~ Epilogue: The Case against the
Hamptons
~~~
"Aligning Emerson and Thoreau with exploration narratives by Lewis and Clark,
Pike, and others, West of Emerson realigns the standard map of regional
American literature. Focusing on New England, it reorients our understanding of
the literature of the west. Fresonke writes with grace and wit and sees the
rhetoric of both manifest destiny and New England Transcendentalism with new
eyes." ~~~Brook Thomas, author of American Literary Realism and the Failed
Promise of Contract
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Farrell, James T.,
STUDS LONIGAN, A TRILOGY:
Young Lonigan; The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan; Judgment Day
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 2004), 1024 pages.
~~~ An unparalleled example of American naturalism, Farrell's trilogy follows the hopes and dissipations of a would-be “tough guy” and archetypal adolescent through the turbulent years of World War I, the Roaring Twenties, and the Great Depression. The three novels offer a vivid sense of the textures of real life: the poolroom and the dance marathon, romance and marriage, gangsterism and ethnic rivalry, and the slang of the street corner.
$35.00
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Frost, Robert,
COLLECTED POEMS, PROSE AND PLAYS.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1995), 1039 pages.
~~~ The first authoritative and comprehensive collection of Frost's writings, bringing together all the
major poetry, all of Frost's dramatic writing, and the most extensive gathering of his prose writings ever
published. The core of this collection is the 1949 "Complete Poems," the last edition supervised by the
poet himself - free of the unauthorized editorial changes introduced into subsequent editions.
$35.00
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[Fuller] Robert N. Hudspeth (ed), THE LETTERS OF MARGARET FULLER, Volume I: 1817-38. NEW copy, hardcover with dust jacket. Cornell University Press, Second Printing, 1992 (first published 1983). Photographs of principal correspondents. Thoroughly annotated & indexed. 374 pages. "Margaret Fuller (1810-50) - pioneering feminist, Transcendentalist, critic, journalist, revolutionary - was one of the most influential women in the American literary circles of her day. Her many letters - of which nearly a thousand have survived - constitute an autobiography of her intellectual and emotional life. This volume is the first in a major new series that, when completed, will make available all of the extant letters. The first letters in Volume I are those of a seven-year-old child; the last were written by an uncommonly well-educated woman ready for a larger challenge than schoolteaching could offer her. The letters tell the story of her work with Amos Bronson Alcott and his experimental Temple School, of the early days of her friendship with Ralph Waldo Emerson, of the beginnings of her life as a writer, and of her important work as translator and critic of Goethe."
Currently in print at $57.95.
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Hawthorne, Nathaniel,
THE SCARLET LETTER (Signature Classics). NEW copy. Hardcover. Trident Press International, 298 pages. "As she emerges from the prison of a Puritan New England town, Hester Prynne defies the dark gloom much as the rose blooms against the prison door. With her illegitimate baby, Pearl, clutched in her arms and the letter A - the mark of an adulteress - embroidered in scarlet thread on her breast, Hester holds her head high as she faces the malice and scorn of the townsfolk. Her powerful, bittersweet story is an American classic that continues to touch the hearts of modern readers with its timeless themes of guilt, passion and repentance."
$25.00
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Hawthorne, Nathaniel,
TALES AND SKETCHES; TWICE-TOLD TALES; MOSSES FROM AN OLD MANSE; THE SNOW IMAGE, &
OTHER TWICE-TOLD TALES; A WONDER BOOK FOR GIRLS & BOYS; TANGLEWOOD TALES
. NEW copy. Hardcover with dustjacket. (Library of America, 1982), 1493 pages.
~~~ An authoritative edition of all Hawthorne's tales and sketches in a single comprehensive volume.
The stories are arranged in the order of their periodical publication.
$45.00
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[Hawthorne] John Dolis, THE STYLE OF HAWTHORNE’S GAZE:
Regarding Subjectivity. University of Alabama Press,
1993. NEW copy. Hardcover with dust jacket, still in shrinkwrap. From Booknews:
"Dolis contends that Hawthorne's interest in methods of representation can be
compared to and prefigures the work of Baudelaire, Cezanne, and later the cubists.
Likewise, he shows how the work of Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Freud, Lacan, and
Derrida can provide fresh insights into Hawthorne's perception of and representation
of reality."
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[Hawthorne] Edwin Haviland Miller, SALEM IS MY DWELLING PLACE: A Life of Nathaniel Hawthorne. VG.VG. Hardcover, with dust jacket in mylar. University of Iowa Press, 1991. First Edition. Forty-none photographs and nine drawings, notes, bibliography, index, 596 pages. ~~~ From Kirkus Reviews: "Major biography of 'America's first great storyteller,' meticulously researched and admirably written by N.Y.U. English professor Miller (Melville: A Biography, 1975). Born in 1804, Hawthorne belonged to the same generation as Poe, Melville, and Whitman -— that is, the first generation of American writers who sought to endow their work with an explicitly American tone and sensibility. The son of a sea captain, with family roots in Massachusetts reaching back to the early 17th century, Hawthorne was raised amid the bleak certitudes of Calvinist New England, a world as self-contained and harsh as the rocky coast of his native Salem. Introspective and melancholy as a child, he grew up an intensely secretive and reclusive man, distant from all but his wife and few close friends. Miller is prescient enough to discern the Byronic qualities of Hawthorne -— the restless awkwardness, the childish solitude typical of fatherless sons—that set him apart from most of his New England contemporaries (Emerson, for example, or Longfellow) and mark him, along with Poe, as one of the few genuine Romantics ever seen in America. We are given a careful and accurate portrayal of Hawthorne's various incarnations: the sensitive youth, the troubled Utopian (Hawthorne spent six unhappy months at Brook Farm), the awkward suitor, the distant father, the literary and political schemer. What emerges most strongly from Miller's splendid chronicle is the degree to which Hawthorne's own development coincided with the birth of America's literary culture. The best, and most thorough, biography yet of Hawthorne, setting the standard against which all others will be measured."
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Irving, Washington (Anthony Brandt, ed),
THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN BONNEVILLE.
(National Geographic Society).
NEW copy. Trade PAPERBACK. 290 pages.
~~~ Captain Benjamin L. E. Bonneville left the east for California in May of 1832.
No one heard from him, and many people assumed he was either a deserter, or dead. Three
years later he returned. Washington Irving met
Bonneville, bought the rights to his journal and, after editing it and recasting
it in the third person, published it. It is probably the most literate, readable
description of the fur trapper era.
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Irving, Washington,
BRACEBRIDGE HALL, TALES OF A TRAVELLER AND THE ALHAMBRA
.
NEW copy. Hardcover with dustjacket. (Library of America, 1991), 1104 pages.
~~~ Three story collections from the first American author to burst onto the
international literary scene. The Alhambra, Irving's "Spanish Sketchbook," was
inspired by his 1829 residence at the ancient Moorish palace at Granada; weaving
history, legend, and description, it remains the best guidebook to this haunting place.
Over 120 tales in all.
$45.00
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Irving, Washington,
HISTORY, TALES AND SKETCHES; LETTERS OF JONATHAN OLDSTYLE,
GENT; SALMAGUNDI; A HISTORY OF NEW YORK; THE SKETCH BOOK
OF GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.
NEW copy. Hardcover with dustjacket. (Library of America, 1983), 1144 pages.
~~~ A writer of great urbanity and poise, Washington Irving was America's
first internationally acclaimed man of letters. Here in one volume are the writings
that established his reputation and earned him the admiration of Hawthorne, Poe,
Coleridge, Byron, Scott, and Dickens.
$45.00
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Irving, Washington (Patricia A. Pingry, ed),
THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW.
(Candy Cane Press).
NEW copy. Hardcover with dust jacket. Illustrated by Russ Flint. 64 pages.
~~~ This edition begins with a brief biography of Irving which includes the history
of the story itself, an Irving portrait, and a photograph of his home,
Sunnyside. An introduction of the main characters in the story is offered with a
picture of each along with an explanation of their importance in the story. The
Legend itself has been divided into short chapters for easier reading by today's
child, but the text remains Irving's original, from his 1848 revised edition.
These new chapter titles reflect the tongue-in-cheek style which pervades the
story. Likewise, Russ Flint's rich oil paintings continue the facetiousness of
Irving's writing style. This wonderful book will grab children by its fanciful
plot, the fear of Ichabod, and the fury of the Headless Horseman.
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Irving, Washington,
THREE WESTERN NARRATIVES: A TOUR ON THE PRAIRIE / ASTORIA /
THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN BONNEVILLE
.
NEW copy. Hardcover with dustjacket. (Library of America, 2004), 1104 pages.
~~~ America’s first internationally acclaimed author, Irving was also one of
the first to write about the country's then far-western frontier. A Tour on the
Prairies, published in 1835, is an early and distinctly American depiction of the
young nation’s borderland and its native inhabitants. Astoria recounts John Jacob
Astor’s attempt to establish a commercial empire in the Pacific Northwest; while
The Adventures of Captain Bonneville is a lively saga of exploration among the
mountains, rivers, and deserts of the Far West.
$40.00
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Irving, Washington,
WORKS OF WASHINGTON IRVING, KNICKERBOCKER EDITION, ILLUSTRATED, IN 27 VOLUMES.
(NY: J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1870-71). 12mo, 5 1/4" x 7 1/2", 27 volumes. Nicely bound in 3/4 green
morocco over marbled sides with matching end papers and page edges;
panelled spines with five raised bands,
gilt floral decoration,
and gilt lettering. 183 illustrations, mostly engravings, including engraved title pages and two
manuscript facsimiles.
For complete descriptive list of individual volumes, with photographs,
click here.
$1500.00
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James, Henry,
COLLECTED TRAVEL WRITINGS:
The Continent; A Little Tour in France; Italian Hours; Other Travels.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1993), 850 pages.
~~~ Brings together James's first 24 published stories. Here are the first explorations of some of James's most significant themes: the force of social convention and the compromises it demands; the complex and often ambiguous encounter between Europe and America; and the energies of human passion measured against the rigors of artistic discipline.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
COMPLETE STORIES, 1864-1874.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1999), 972 pages.
~~~ Brings together James's first 24 published stories. Here are the first explorations of some of James's most significant themes: the force of social convention and the compromises it demands; the complex and often ambiguous encounter between Europe and America; and the energies of human passion measured against the rigors of artistic discipline.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
COMPLETE STORIES, 1874-1884.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1999), 950 pages.
~~~ The stories collected here show James working out, in a more concise fictional laboratory, themes that also appear in such novels of the period as The Portrait of a Lady and The Bostonians. Adventurous in narrative technique, yet marked by precise observation rendered in quicksilver prose, the stories of James's middle period present a breathtaking array of memorable characters and beguiling scenarios.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
COMPLETE STORIES, 1892-1898.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1996), 948 pages.
~~~ The 21 stories in this volume represent James at the peak of his powers. Among them are "The Turn of the Screw," one of his most popular works, and a terrifying exercise in psychological horror centering on the corruption of childhood innocence; "The Real Thing," a playful consideration of the illusion of art and the paradoxes of authenticity; "The Figure in the Carpet," "The Death of the Lion," and "The Middle Years," three very different expositions of James's most profound insights into the nature of his own art.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
COMPLETE STORIES, 1898-1910.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1996), 950 pages.
~~~ The 31 stories gathered in this volume are the culmination of James's glorious final period. Among them are the extraordinary fantasies "The Great Good Place" and "The Jolly Corner," where haunting hints of the supernatural express undercurrents of yearning and dislocation; "The Birthplace," a comic tale about the commercialization of genius; and the masterful "The Beast in the Jungle," a harrowing account of a man's confrontation with lost opportunities.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
NOVELS 1871-1880: Watch & Ward; Roderick Hudson; The American; The Europeans; Confidence.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1983), 1287 pages.
~~~ The first five novels of Henry James, presented complete in this volume,
feature sparkling dialogue, masterfully timed suspense, and the romance of youthful
artistic aspirations. The contrast between Europe and America, which gives a special
dimension to all of James's cultural observations, is brilliantly deployed in these early
works.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
NOVELS 1881-1886:
Washington Square; The Portrait of a Lady; The Bostonian.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1985), 1249 pages.
~~~ Presents three major novels from James's early middle years. These
studies in the exercise of power between the sexes, classes, and cultures portray
American women confronting crises of independence and possession, and mark
James as coming into the height of his talent.
$40.00
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James, Henry,
NOVELS 1886-1890:
The Princess Casamassima; The Reverberator; The Tragic Muse.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1989), 1296 pages.
~~~ The three novels in this volume from Henry James's middle period
explore some historical and social dilemmas that belong as much to our time as
to his own. The Princess Casamassima, published in 1886, is a political novel in
which anarchists and terrorists conspire within a fin de siècle world of
opulence and glamour. Also included are The Reverberator (1888), and
The Tragic Muse (1890).
$40.00
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James, Henry,
NOVELS 1901-1902:
The Sacred Fount; Wings of the Dove.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 2006), 726 pages.
~~~ Includes The Sacred Fount (1901), one of James's most unusual
experiments, and The Wings of the Dove (1902), one of his most beloved masterpieces and the novel that inaugurated the majestic and intricate "late phase" of his literary career.
$35.00
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 (Judd), Hathaway, Richard D.,
SYLVESTER JUDD'S NEW ENGLAND.
Pennsylvania State University Press, 1981., F/F, new, unopened. Extensive
notes, bibliography, index, 362. Biography of Unitarian minister and novelist,
Sylvester Judd (1813-1853), a colleague of Emerson's and friend of Jones Very.
(Originally in print at $35, now out of print).
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 Kasson, Joy S.
ARTISTIC VOYAGERS: Europe and the American Imagination in the Works of
Irving, Allston, Cole, Cooper, and Hawthorne.
Greenwood Press, 1982, Contributions in American
Studies, No. 10., Fine, new, unopened. In green boards without DJ as issued. Notes,
bibliography, index, 206 pp. (In print at $49.95).
$35.00
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Lewis, Sinclair,
ARROWSMITH; ELMER GANTRY; and DODSWORTH.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 2002), 1346 pages.
~~~ In Arrowsmith, Lewis portrays the medical career of a physician who
finds his commitment to the ideals of his profession tested by the cynicism and
opportunism he encounters in private practice, public health work, and scientific
research. Elmer Gantry aroused intense controversy with its brutal depiction of a
hypocritical preacher in relentless pursuit of worldly pleasure and power.
Dodsworth follows a retired automobile manufacturer as he travels through
Europe with his increasingly restless wife.
$40.00
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London, Jack,
NOVELS AND STORIES:
The Call of the Wild; White Fang; The Sea-Wolf; Klondike Stories.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 1982), 1021 pages.
~~~ Includes London's best-known novels together with selections from his Klondike tales and previously uncollected short stories. Set in California, Mexico, Alaska, and the South Seas, these works capture the romance and violence of adventure with vigorous narratives and an intuitive feeling for animal life.
$35.00
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Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth,
POEMS AND OTHER WRITINGS.
NEW copy, Hardcover with
dust jacket. (Library of America, 2000), 854 pages.
~~~ No American writer of the 19th century was more universally enjoyed and admired than Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. His works were extraordinary bestsellers for their era, achieving fame both here and abroad. For the first time in over 25 years, this comprehensive volume offers a full-scale literary portrait of America's greatest popular poet.
$35.00
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Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth,
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW: Selected Poems
NEW copy; trade PAPERBACK.
(Penguin Classics, 1988)
389 pages.
~~~
This collection brings together Longfellow's best and most famous poems,
providing a complete overview of his versatile and multifaceted genius. All the
classic Longfellow selections, including A Psalm of Life, The Children's Hour,
and The Day is Done, are here, as well as lesser-known but equally worthy poems,
like The Cross of Snow, a sonnet written in memory of his second wife, who died
tragically in a fire. Also included, in their entirety, are his two long
narrative masterpieces, Evangeline and The Courtship of Miles Standish.
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[Spoon River]
Masters, Edgar Lee, SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY.
NEW copy, trade PAPERBACK. (Touchstone).
292 pages.
~~~ In 1915, Edgar Lee Masters published a book of dramatic
monologues written in free verse about a fictional town called
"Spoon River", (a composite of two actual towns on that river
where Edgar Lee Masters grew up). The shocking scandals and secret
tragedies of Spoon River were immediately recognized by readers as
authentic. Masters raises the dead "sleeping on the hill" in the
village cemetery to tell the truth about their lives, and their
testimony topples the American myth of the moral superiority of
small-town life. Spoon River is as undeniably corrupt and cruel as the
big city, and is home to murderers, drunkards, crooked bankers,
lechers, bitter wives and abusive husbands, failed dreamers, and a
few good souls. The freshness of this landmark work has not
diminished, and Spoon River
Anthology remains an American classic.
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$10.00
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[Melville]
Newton Arvin, HERMAN MELVILLE
Grove Press., NEW copy, TRADE PAPERBACK. 316 pages.
~~~~ "One of America's most enigmatic literary figures, Herman Melville lived a
life full of adventure, hardship, and moral conflict. Known for his nautical escapades.
Melville first went to sea in his early twenties, sailing to England and then Polynesia
where he found himself fleeing from cannibals, joining a mutiny, and frolicking with
naked islanders. His novels were, for the most part, unsuccessful and misunderstood,
and later in life he had to accept work as a low-level customs agent to support his wife
and children. His only close friend was Nathaniel Hawthorne to whom he dedicated
Moby-Dick. Newton Arvin's eminently readable biography beautifully captures the
troubled, often reclusive man whose major works include Typee, Omoo, Bartleby
the Scrivener, Billy Budd, and his indisputable masterpiece, Moby-Dick."
~~~~ From Library Journal: "...Arvin's portrait of Melville snagged a National
Book Award (NBA) in 1950 and is still a leading title on the sailor turned author..."
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Melville, Herman, MOBY DICK.
NEW copy, hardcover with dust jacket. Castle Books,
2004. 725 pages. ~~~~
"Call me Ishmael. Some years ago--never mind how long precisely -- having little or
no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I
would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of
driving off the spleen, and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing
grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever
I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear
of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of
me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping
into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off--then, I account it high
time to get to sea as soon as I can."
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[Melville]
Bryant, John, MELVILLE & REPOSE:
The Rhetoric of Humor in the American Renaissance.
Oxford, 1993., NEW, a mint copy. Hardcover with dust jacket. Extensive notes, index.
"John Bryant's book is a strong and significant argument for the centrality of humor in
Melville's novels. The purpose of MELVILLE & REPOSE is dual: to ground
the uses of romantic humor in Melville in sensitive readings of contemporaneous
European and American writings, and to offer a definitive account of the comic as
the shapi ng force of Melville's narrative voice throughout the major phase of his
literary career." Currently in print at $78.
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 [Melville] Elizabeth Hardwick, HERMAN MELVILLE. NEW copy. Hardcover. Penguin (Penguin Lives Series), 2000. 161 pages. From Publishers Weekly: "The Penguin Lives series is a good one: casual but serious, artfully rendered criticism that is not hell-bent on footnotes and references,; the slender volumes are produced by critical writers who are also impressive creative minds in their own right. Melville, whose life story is aptly told by literary critic and novelist Hardwick (Bartleby in Manhattan), is not the most accessible of subjects for a short format like this. Though he was an immensely prolific creator of novels, short fiction, poetry, letters and journals, and though he was one of the most important American writers, his life was barely public enough for any biographer to nail him down. His career is also too complicated to fit into any simple 'rise' and 'decline' paradigm--his genius is unevenly distributed across his works. Nonetheless, 'there is a rueful dignity in his life and personal manner,' Hardwick writes. His family responded to him with a 'puzzled sympathy.' Hardwick gives a frank depiction of a depressive, often bitter man who weathered a constant struggle over income ('Dollars damn me,' he wrote), the suicide of a son and, possibly, according to Hardwick, doubts about his own heterosexuality; Melville never seemed to forgive the world for refusing to recognize Moby-Dick as a masterpiece during his lifetime. Through 12 brief chapters, many centered on fresh readings of Melville's works and others thematic ('Whaling,' 'Elizabeth,' 'Hawthorne'), Hardwick's own talent for metaphor and no-nonsense interpretation makes this an especially engaging critical account. Perhaps most importantly, Hardwick is able to convey both the complexity of the man as well as the inherent impossibility of the biographer's task to elucidate fully the life of a multifarious individual. 'He is a mystery,' she writes, 'no materials exist for a full and satisfactory biography of this man.' Still, this work is a delight to read."
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[Melville] Perry Miller, THE RAVEN AND THE
WHALE: Poe, Melville, and the New York Literary Scene.
NEW copy. TRADE PAPERBACK. Johns Hopkins University
Press, 1997. 370 pages. "A social, cultural, and literary history of the New
York literary battleground between 1833 and 1857. First published in 1956, The
Raven and the Whale analyzes the social confusion around the works of authors
such as Poe and Melville, stemming from the intense rivalry between major publishing
firms." ~~~ OUT OF PRINT.
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[Melville]
Robert Penn Warren (ed) SELECTED POEMS OF
HERMAN MELVILLE, A Reader's Edition. NEW
copy. TRADE PAPERBACK. David R. Godine, Publisher, 2004. 465 pages.
"Whitman and Dickinson are the two greatest American poets of the nineteenth
century, but who is the third? Some critics say Whittier, others say Poe, and these
days an increasing number say Herman Melville. The revaluation of Melville's poetry
is due in large part to the influence of this landmark volume, for Melville the poet has
never found a more judicious, eloquent, or persuasive champion than Robert Penn
Warren.
~~~
First published in 1970, Warren's edition remains the most comprehensive selection
of Melville's poetry ever presented. It brings together the best of the Civil War poems
from Battle-Pieces (1866), the portraits of sailors from John Marr
(1888), and the autumnal lyrics from Timoleon (1891), as well as poems
uncollected during Melville's lifetime. Central to the selection are several self-contained
passages from Clarel: A Poem and Pilgrimage to the Holy Land (1876), a
book-length work that Warren calls 'an important document of our modernity ... in
fact, a precursor to The Waste Land, with the same central image, the same flickering
contrasts of the past and the present, the same charade of belief and unbelief.'
~~~
Warren introduces his selection with a valuable interpretive essay, and also provides
copious textual and critical notes. It is a labor of love, this highly personal anthology:
as Warren says in a preface, 'I have called this book 'A Reader's Edition,' and the
reader I refer to is myself. The book may be regarded as a log of my long reading of
Melville's poetry -- of my preferences and prejudices, my impressions and speculations,
my curiosities and investigations.' But to our mind it is something more than that: it is
the most important 'selected' since Malcolm Cowley's Portable Faulkner, a
book that showcases an American master at his most powerful and in a light that
changes our perception of his work forever."
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[Milton] Schulman, Lydia Dittler,
PARADISE LOST, AND THE RISE OF THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC
. Northeastern University Press , 1992. NEW copy. Hardcover
with dust jacket, still in shrinkwrap. Notes, bibliography, index, 273 pages.
Synopsis: "This book examines "how American readers understood and
employed Milton's text before, during, and after the American Revolution. Contending
that Milton's epic, which was written after the fall of the English Commonwealth,
represented the author's 'reflections on the difficulties of creating and sustaining . . .
governments that ultimately rest upon the virtue and self-discipline of their citizens',
Schulman suggests that this embedded debate on republicanism made his poem a
touchstone for secular politicians during the rise of the American republic."
(American Literature). From Booknews: "Schulman argues that
an important, overlooked key to uncovering the social and political subtext of
Milton's (1608-2004) epic is its popularity and use in the early American
republic. At the same time, she demonstrates that an examination of the American
reception of Paradise Lost contributes to an understanding of the ideological
origins of the American Revolution." Annotation. From The American
Historical Review: "For Schulman, the real point is Milton's argument that
republican liberty, based on an educated, virtuous citizenry, must meet the challenge
of controlling narrow self-interest through enlightened reason. . . . If Schulman
inevitably fails to prove her thesis 'definitively,' she succeeds admirably in suggesting
the complexity of Milton's role in the still lively debate over the soul of the republic.
Her book is a strong contribution to that debate."
$45.00
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[Milton] Stavely, Keith W. F.,
PURITAN LEGACIES: Paradise Lost and the New England Tradition, 1630-1890
. Cornell University Press, 1995. NEW copy.
PAPERBACK. Notes, index, 312 pages. Stavely presents "Milton's Paradise Lost
as a model of the tensions inherent in mid-17th-century English Puritanism and
in New England Puritanism through 1890. He {seeks to} show how Milton's portrayal
of Adam, Eve, and Satan represents persistent Puritan conflicts between hierarchy and
egalitarian individual autonomy and between rationality and enthusiasm. {In an attempt}
to illustrate his thesis, Stavely studies the career of 18th-century Westborough,
Massachusetts pastor Rev. Ebenezer Parkman and 19th-century Marlborough,
Massachusetts newspaper editor Charles F. Morse."
$19.00
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[Milton] Van Anglen, K.P.,
NEW ENGLAND MILTON: Literary Reception and Cultural Authority in the Early Republic
. Pennsylvania State University Press , 1993. NEW copy.
Hardcover with dust jacket, still in shrinkwrap. Notes, bibliography, index, 255 pages.
"This is a study of interpretations of Milton by New England intellectuals. "Interpreting
Milton to their advantage, Van Anglen argues, the New England elite used him in their
formulations of consensualist positions that became key elements of the developing American
cultural hegemony. At the same time, restive thinkers from Roger Williams to Walt Whitman
read Milton's works and career as more averse, thereby endorsing a more romantic, rebellious,
and democratic American spirit. After a . . . chapter surveying these conflicts and their
consequences between 1620 and the 1780s, Van Anglen focuses upon the Unitarians and the
transcendentalists in his remaining chapters. . . . {In} readings of {William Ellery}
Channing's review of Milton's De Doctrina, Emerson's essay 'John Milton,' his poem
'Uriel,' and his 'Divinity School Address,' and Thoreau's A Week on the Concord and
Merrimack Rivers and Walden {Van Anglen aims to} demonstrate how each
transcended the
dualism and contradictions of cultural authority." (New England Quarterly).
Currently in print at $59.
$40.00
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