Herman Melville Essay

Writer, write an essay where you make sure you answer the following questions: 36. Explain Melville's use of contrasts in Billy Budd. 37. Explain how Melville's private experiences influenced his work. 38. Summarize the human weaknesses that Melville portrayed in several of his shorter works. To help you out, keep this into consideration. (this was a prior essay done by one of your coworkers) Use the reference as one of your 6. In Herman Melville's novel, Billy Budd, the contrast between good and evil is apparent throughout the book. In this book, Billy is depicted as holy and pure character as sharply contrasted with his antagonist-Claggort. Just before his death, Billy's purity is symbolized by his white garb, and natural growing of good. Incidentally, the symbolic death that was met by both Billy and Claggort portrays a sharp contrast. Billy death is portrayed as good as it happened in the dawn where" Billy ascended and ascending took the full rose of the dawn.” on the other hand, Claggort death is portrayed as bad as it is very short and appropriate. Also to denote evil, Claggort is described as having" silken jet curls and pallor tinged with a faint shade of amber skin'' as opposed to Billy's “welkin-ayes”, blonde hair, and tan complexion which denotes a good character (Herman 16). Ironically, Billy though portrayed as having a good character did the unexpected and kills Claggort with a blow. This sharply brings a contrast as he is expected to commit such an evil act. Finally, Billy is portrayed as the evil doer when captain Vere orders for his execution and Claggort brought out as a martyr. Even the newspapers portrayed Billy death as a price he paid for his crime. Contrary to the expectations, Billy shouts “god bless captain” when the captain ordered for his persecution, a very ironic scenario (Herman 26) In the product of his imagination, Melvilles sexual inclination has played a central role. During his child hood Melville was isolated from his peers which perhaps inspired his interest with men more than women. As a result, Melville had to bring out such persona in his work. For example, in ‘Fragments', he depicts the relation ship between a young orphan man who engages in a friendship with another male. Incidentally, his need for a relationship with another leads to creation of tragic incidences of sexual repression as portrayed in ‘Billy Budd' (Herman 31). Not considered as very good looking, being treated as inferior, not being appreciated and leading an isolated live has resulted to traits of orphan, outcast and the Apollo featured in many of his writing. In fragment he featured a young man without a family and an older father perhaps reflecting his regrettable background. The orphan engages in a friendship with another male. In several of his work, humans are portrayed as evil beings and can do any harm to each other for some evil reason. In essence Melville depicts evil as the nature of mankind and that man is born evil. In many of Melville's novels, cannibalism and homosexuality is very evident and seems to be tangled up with each other. Men are portrayed as interested with men more than women and humans as lovers of human fresh, which forces them to result to murderous acts. Melville portrays characters in most of his work as repressive and discriminating, a fact that is brought out very clearly in “Billy Budd” where Billy's intellectual power was not appreciated and he was discriminated against his siblings (Herman 52). Melville clearly portrays human as obsessed characters. In his work, Melville portrays Ahab as just human, barely governed by human way of life and principles and almost totally subject to his own obsession with Moby Dick. Works Cited Herman, Melville. Billy Budd. London: Wordsworth Editions, 2000.