Shedding new light on both classic and lesser-known works in the Melville canon with particular attention to the author's literary use of the Bible, Neither Believer Nor Infidel examines the debate between religious skepticism and Christian faith that infused Herman Melville's writings following Moby-Dick. Jonathan A. Cook's study is the first to focus on the decisive role of faith and doubt in Melville's writings following his mid-career turn to shorter fiction, and still later to poetry, as a result of the commercial failures of Moby-Dick and Pierre. Nathaniel Hawthorne claimed that Melville "can neither believe nor be comfortable in his unbelief," a remark that encapsulates an essential truth about Melville's attitude to Christianity. Like many of his Victorian contemporaries, Melville spent his literary career poised between an intellectual rejection of Christian dogma and an emotional attachment to the consolations of non-dogmatic Christian faith. Accompanying this ambivalence was a lifelong devotion to the text of the King James Bible as both moral sourcebook and literary template. Following a biographical overview of skeptical influences and manifestations in Melville's early life and career, Cook examines the evidence of religious doubt and belief in "Bartleby, the Scrivener," "Cock-a-Doodle-Doo!," "The Encantadas," Israel Potter, Battle-Pieces, Timoleon, and Billy Budd. Accessible for both the general reader and the scholar, Neither Believer Nor Infidel clarifies the ambiguities of Melville's pervasive use of religion in his fiction and poetry. In analyzing Melville's persistent oscillation between metaphysical rebellion and attenuated belief, Cook elucidates both well-known and under-appreciated works.

Drawing on studies of survivor psychology, this work provides an illuminating new reading of Moby-Dick. Janet Reno gives Ishmael new prominence and casts light on many of Moby-Dick's structural and thematic features.

A “brilliant and provocative” (The New Yorker) celebration of Melville’s masterpiece—from the bestselling author of In the Heart of the Sea, Valiant Ambition, and In the Hurricane's Eye One of the greatest American novels finds its perfect contemporary champion in Why Read Moby-Dick?, Nathaniel Philbrick’s enlightening and entertaining tour through Melville’s classic. As he did in his National Book Award–winning bestseller In the Heart of the Sea, Philbrick brings a sailor’s eye and an adventurer’s passion to unfolding the story behind an epic American journey. He skillfully navigates Melville’s world and illuminates the book’s humor and unforgettable characters—finding the thread that binds Ishmael and Ahab to our own time and, indeed, to all times. An ideal match between author and subject, Why Read Moby-Dick? will start conversations, inspire arguments, and make a powerful case that this classic tale waits to be discovered anew. “Gracefully written [with an] infectious enthusiasm…”—New York Times Book Review

Reproduction of the original.

Moby-Dick; or, The Whale (1851) is the sixth book by American writer Herman Melville. The work is an epic sea story of Captain Ahab's voyage in pursuit of Moby Dick, a great white whale. It initially received mixed reviews and at Melville's death in 1891 was remembered, if at all, as a children's sea adventure, but now is considered one of the Great American Novels and a leading work of American Romanticism. The opening line, "Call me Ishmael," is one of the most recognizable opening lines in Western literature. Ishmael then narrates the voyage of the whaleship Pequod, commanded by Captain Ahab. Ahab has one purpose: revenge on Moby Dick, a ferocious, enigmatic white whale which on a previous voyage destroyed Ahab's ship and severed his leg at the knee. The detailed and realistic descriptions of whale hunting and the process of extracting whale oil, as well as life aboard ship among a culturally diverse crew, are mixed with exploration of class and social status, good and evil, and the existence of God.

In a unique and probing analysis, this study examines the function of literary criticism in religious studies and explores the relation of literature to religion in the works of major American writers.

A groundbreaking exploration of the themes of faith and doubt in Emily Dickinson's poetry

ÒHuman madness is oftentimes a cunning and most feline thing.Ó

Psychotherapy's Pilgrim-Poet: The Story Within imaginatively describes the interior experience of the therapeutic client by utilizing the images of epic literature as an interpretive lens for the psychotherapeutic process. Through the characters, plot, and psychological landscape of The Epic of Gilgamesh, Homer's Odyssey, Herman Melville's Moby-Dick, and Toni Morrison's Beloved, we look anew at the client's motivation to journey, their courage, affects, memories and wounds, the therapeutic bond, the encounter with the unconscious, and the act of story-telling. The author demonstrates that depth psychological work is a soulful pilgrimage characterized by a spiritual and heroic descent to the deep psyche in pursuit of wholeness and the authentic self. Although this book is theoretically informed, it is not intended to provide clinical explanations; rather, it aspires to describe the psychotherapeutic experience from an inside point of view, from the inner life of the client. The primary aim is to renew and deepen an understanding of the client's profoundly difficult and courageous psychological endeavor in depth psychotherapy. This book is a culmination of the author's experiences as researcher, teacher, therapist, enthused reader of epic, and most importantly, as client. It weaves together the author's personal stories with client vignettes, epic literature, depth psychology, mythological studies, and literary criticism.