Table of Contents
Series Foreword Patrick J. Deneen ix
Introduction: American Tragedy: The Political Thought of Herman Melville Jason Frank 1
1 Who Eats Whom? Melville's Anthropolitics at the Dawn of Pacific Imperialism Kennan Ferguson 21
2 "The End Was in the Beginning": Melville, Ellison, and the Democratic Death of Progress in Typee and Omoo Sophia Mihic 42
3 Chasing the Whale: Moby-Dick as Political Theory George Shulman 70
4 Ahab, American Susan McWilliams 109
5 "Mighty Lordships in the Heart of the Republic": The Anti-Rent Subtext to Pierre Roger W. Hecht 141
6 Melville and the Cadaverous Triumphs of Transcendentalism Shannon L. Mariotti 162
7 Language and Labor, Silence and Stasis: Bartleby among the" Philosophers Kevin Attell 194
8 Melville's "Permanent Riotocracy" Michael Jonik 229
9 What Babo Saw: Benito Cereno and "the World We Live In" Lawrie Balfour 259
10 "Follow Your Leader": Benito Cereno and the Case of Two Ships Tracy B. Strong 281
11 The Metaphysics of Indian-Hating Revisited Thomas Dumm 310
12 Melville's War Poetry and the Human Form Roger Berkowitz 333
13 The Lyre of Orpheus: Aesthetics and Authority in Billy Budd Jason Frank 358
14 Melville's Law Jennifer L. Culbert 386
Acknowledgments 413
Selected Bibliography 415
List of Contributors 423
Index 427