Argues that Herman Melville’s later work anticipates the resurgence of an American exceptionalist ethos underpinning the U.S.-led global ‘war on terror.’
Oriented by the new Americanist perspective, this book constitutes a rereading of Herman Melville’s most prominent fiction after Moby-Dick. In contrast to prior readings of this fiction, William V. Spanos’s interpretation takes as its point of departure the theme of spectrality precipitated by the metaphor of orphanage-disaffiliation from the symbolic fatherland, on the one hand, and the myth of American exceptionalism on the other-that emerged as an abiding motif in Melville’s creative imagination. This book voices an original argument about Melville’s status as an ‘American’ writer, and foregrounds Melville’s remarkable anticipation and critique of the exceptionalism that continues to drive American policy in the post-9/11 era.
Table of Content
Acknowledgments
1. Melville’s Specter: An Introduction
2. Pierre’s Extraordinary Emergency: Melville and the ‘Voice of Silence’
3. Herman Melville’s Israel Potter: Refl ections on a Damaged Life
4. ‘Benito Cereno’ and ‘Bartleby, the Scrivener’: Reflections on the American Calling
1. ‘Benito Cereno’: The ‘Vision’ of American Exceptionalism
2. ‘Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Wall-Street Story’: Melville’s Politics of Refusal
5. Cavilers and Con Men: The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade
6. American Confidence in the Age of Globalization: Melville’s Witness
Notes
Index
About the author
William V. Spanos is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature at Binghamton University, State University of New York. He is the author of many books, including American Exceptionalism in the Age of Globalization: The Specter of Vietnam and Herman Melville and the American Calling: The Fiction after Moby-Dick, 1851–1857, both also published by SUNY Press.
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