| Clarel: A Poem and Pilgrimage in the Holy Land |  | Author: Herman Melville
Creator: Hershel Parker
Publisher: Northwestern University Press
Category: Book
List Price: $19.95
Buy New: $13.57
You Save: $6.38 (32%)
Avg. Customer Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 837441
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 499
ISBN: 0773751920
Dewey Decimal Number: 811
EAN: 9780773751927
ASIN: 0773751920
Publication Date: August 1, 2008 (New: Last 30 Days)
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Not yet published
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Product Description
Melville’s long poem Clarel: A Poem and Pilgrimage in the Holy Land (1876) was the last full-length book he published. Until the mid-twentieth century even the most partisan of Melville’s advocates hesitated to endure a four-part poem of 150 cantos and almost 18,000 lines about a naive American named Clarel, on pilgrimage through the Palestinian ruins with a provocative cluster of companions.
But modern critics have found Clarel a much better poem than was ever realized. Robert Penn Warren called it a precursor of The Waste Land. It abounds with revelations of Melville’s inner life. Most strikingly, it is argued that the character Vine is a portrait of Melville’s friend Nathaniel Hawthorne. Clarel is one of the most complex theological explorations of faith and doubt in all of American literature, and this edition brings Melville’s poem to new life.
Book Description
Melville’s long poem Clarel: A Poem and Pilgrimage in the Holy Land (1876) was the last full-length book he published. Until the mid-twentieth century even the most partisan of Melville’s advocates hesitated to endure a four-part poem of 150 cantos and almost 18,000 lines, about a naive American named Clarel, on pilgrimage through the Palestinian ruins with a provocative cluster of companions.
But modern critics have found Clarel a much better poem than was ever realized. Robert Penn Warren called it a precursor of The Waste Land. It abounds with revelations of Melville’s inner life. Most strikingly, it is argued that the character Vine is a portrait of Melville’s friend Nathaniel Hawthorne. Clarel is one of the most complex theological explorations of faith and doubt in all of American literature, and this edition brings Melville’s poem to new life.
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| Customer Reviews:
A great poem but only for the hardy November 29, 2005
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
Melville is known universally for his single decade of prose, not his three and a half decades dedicated to poetry. In part, this suggests his relative achievement in the two genres. In part, our ignorance stems from the general fate of poetry as it has been almost totally displaced by the novel over the last 200 years. In the case of Clarel, the situation is even more trying: 500 pages (one of the longest poems in any language) of iambic tetrameter are not calculated for popular sale. Indeed, Melville had a growing tendency to push the average reader away especially as his works sold in inverse proportion to his growing skill. Still, this is an epic that informs us about Melville's relation with God and America's relations with religion and the old world. So if you care deeply about him or the ideas which haunt our country, you should read this best edition of the poem.
A Problematic But Great Classic March 15, 2001
10 out of 12 found this review helpful
Since no one else has written about Clarel, I thought I'd be nice to Melville and congratulate him on his epic poem. Although the poetry itself isn't always brilliant, I felt that the general tone of melancholic spirituality was powerful. Essentially, to me, Clarel was about a young man questioning his world, and searching for meaning in a seemingly meaningless existence. The book parallels Melville's own travels in Jeruseleum, and with this work, we get a glimpse into Melville's interpretation of spirituality. Highly recommended, considering that it is overshadowed by that other Melville work (Moby Dick, of course!).
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