Billy Budd, Sailor and Selected Tales (Oxford World's Classics)

Like any collection of short stories, there are good and not-as-good pieces here. Melville's writing is fairly impeccable, excruciatingly precise—sometimes it borders on fanatical—but perfect style does not always lead to a great story.I know that some of the short stories found in this book are considered classics of the form, but oddly enough, the ones most often cited as "classics" did not impress me. Both "Bartleby" and "Benito Cereno" left me with a shrug, "Bartleby" especially because it lacked the gorgeous prose that Melville usually employed. They were not as forgettable as some of the stories in this collection ("The Fiddler" and "I and My Chimney"), but nothing I would savor reading again. "Bartleby" is just too straight-forward, and "Benito Cereno" is kind of a mess. The latter is one of those stories where the second half explains what was going on in the first. By then, I'd figured it out and it seemed redundant and ham-fisted. "Benito Cereno" also rides a line of ambiguity when it comes to some issues (namely race) which a modern reader might be more sensitive to—so much so that I really couldn't figure out how Melville wanted the reader to feel about the story's black slaves. (Further research only emphasized that ambiguity, showing different takes on the story's meaning since the time it was published. Maybe that ambiguity is to the story's credit, but it left a bad taste in my mouth.)Two of the stories in the collection are fairly comical: "Cock-a-Doodle-Doo!" and "The Lightning-Rod Man." I can imagine people in the 1800s reading these stories in the magazine they were published and being amused. The first takes some swipes at transcendentalism, the other at fire-and-brimstone preaching. But like "The Fiddler" and "I and My Chimney," they're not part of the American literature canon for a reason.The maritime tragedy "Billy Budd" was kind of a surprise to me. Melville, frustrated with how people received his prose, spent decades writing only poetry. The manuscript to "Billy Budd" was found after his death, a secret return to prose. I was pretty astonished by how thick Melville's prose was in this story. Usually his writing is pretty dense and requires the reader to slow down, but this was beyond even his norm. Often I had to read sentences aloud to understand. I got lost in many of them, and I would have to decide to re-read it, or just soldier on. It was something of a return to the symbolism and allegory of "Moby Dick," but the density made it difficult to really relish and enjoy.I did, however really enjoy two of the stories in this collection, the first of which was "The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids." Here Melville compares the horrible disparity between the lives of rich male lawyers and poor women factory-workers in 1800s London. The language is evocative, emotional, and clever.But by and far, my favorite story was "The Encantadas," where Melville seamlessly weaves personal experiences and fiction around the Galapagos islands. His descriptions of the barren islands are beautiful and rich, infused with philosophical ruminations and giant tortoises. Although he spends the first half of the novella describing the islands and providing small anecdotes, he turns the second half away from the landscape and tells some longer Galapagos stories, the best of which involves a woman shipwrecked and surviving on the island alone. More than anything else in this collection, "The Encantadas" still lingers in my mind, calling to be revisited.

Melville's novella, Biily Budd, is a classic - so rich with symbolic power one hardly is able to make "sense" of it all or have it "fit" into any one (or two) well wrapped, tidy, boxes. The narrative is simple enough to be sure, but it's the symbolic resonances, innumerable, like the sun glistening off individual waves on the sea, that makes it hard to really put this book down and move on. Its most basic theme is the undoing of innocence - a theme that clearly has metaphysical levels, but equally well relates to Melville's own life and struggles. It's a wonderful work to sit and think about (never really to be "done" doing so) and just a plain good 'ol sea yarn as well. Highly recommended not only as an "easy" entry-point (in terms of style) into Melville's literary universe, but for its own unique luminosity.

Very Good used book arrived in perfect condition -- no marks or highlighting, all paperback pages in tact

I'd give this 5,000 stars if I could. Herman Melville is a full on #beastmode writer. Thoroughly, utterly, totally enjoyable stuff here.

pretty hard to understand plot because of melville's extended descriptions, but interesting insight on ethics and the martial judicial system

I bought this book for the story of Billy Budd, Sailor because it was mentioned as a context in another book I'm reading by John De Camp about the Franklin Cover up.It's the first time I've read Melville. Excellent prose. I struggled reading it and had to often reread some sentences because they are very complex and long. I can imagine Melville didnt rush his writing and crafted it carefully. It did make me think. The story is about a handsome orphan sailor who is pressed into the English Royal Navy and how he catches the attention of his senior officers.Reminded me of Cormac Mcarthy because of the syntax complexity.Having said that, I read the story in a couple of hours spread out over a few days after work.

je connaissais plus Billy Budd par Britten que par Melville et j'ai été enchantée de découvrir l'histoire originale ; prodigieux évidemment

This was a present for someone who had been wanting it for a long time

I've just discovered Melville and have fallen in love with his style of writing. This is a very good collection. I don't mind admitting this, although I'm pretty sure that Bartleby the Scrivener might have preferred not to.

The product was delivered as promised, within a couple of days and was of the highest quality and competitively priced.