Herman Melville Archives

Benito Cereno

August 3, 2011 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Benito Cereno (1856) was published in the collection The Piazza Tales which Melville wrote after the disappointing reception of his masterpiece Moby Dick which had appeared in 1851. Like many of his other works Benito Cereno is rich in ambiguities, symbolism, and profound meanings beneath its surface narrative. It’s based upon a documentary record of historical events written by the real Amasa Delano in 1817, but of course Melville dramatises ‘the capture of a ship’ to make it richer in suggestive allusion.

The events of the story are an exercise in sustained irony (a device also used by another mariner-novelist, Joseph Conrad). The first time reader is invited to see circumstances exactly as Captain Amasa Delano encounters them, as he goes from his own ship to offer help to a striken fellow captain. Everything he confronts is baffling, contradictory, and uncertain. He struggles to interpret what he finds, but is hampered by his own inclination to believe the best of everybody he meets. The truth of the situation is only revealed very dramatically at the very last minute.

Benito Cereno – critical commentary

Narrative

Most of Benito Cereno is told from the point of view of Amasa Delano. We encounter the puzzling conditions on board the San Dominick as he does; we have things presented to us as he sees them, and we do not have any other point of view by which to achieve a fictional triangulation to assess what is going on (except in a second or subsequent reading).

Melville’s narrative technique sometimes takes us into Delano’s thoughts, almost in a form of interior monologue, and at times Delano even addresses himself, as if thinking out loud.

The novella is set in 1799 – only a few years after the start of the slave uprising in San Domingo (now Haiti).

Present day readers cannot fail to notice that two of the Spanish crew of the San Dominick are killed by what is now called ‘friendly fire’. That is, when the Americans attack the San Dominick in order to recapture it from the rebel slaves, they mistakenly kill two Spanish sailors who are on their own side in the conflict.

The Novella

Benito Cereno was published as part of The Piazza Tales (1856); it is about 25,000 words long; and it could be regarded as a long short story – but it fulfils many of the criteria for being classed as a novella.

Unity of place

Almost the whole of the story takes place in one location – on board the San Dominick. Captain Delano goes to inspect the ship, climbs aboard alone, and stays there until his boat comes (for the second time) to take him back to the Bachelor’s Delight.

Even the depositions in court (which constitute the ‘explanation’ for what happened) are scenes which took place on board the San Dominick prior to its encounter with the Bachelor’s Delight.

Unity of action

The essential drama of the story unfolds in more or less one continuous action. Moreover, these events are compressed into the shortest possible chronological sequence – less than one whole day. Captain Delano goes on board the San Dominick in the morning, He takes a ‘frugal’ lunch with Captain Cereno. And when his boat ‘Rover’ comes back for the second time to take him back, he returns to the Bachelor’s Delight. The action of the story is concentrated in an almost Aristotelian manner to produce unity of time and action.

Unity of atmosphere

The whole of the narrative is shrouded in mists, becalmed seas, and symbols of mystery and ambiguity. The skies are gray, the San Dominick looks like a ‘white-washed monastery after a thunder-storm’. Nothing is quite what it seems. Delano is constantly baffled by the contradictions and mysteries he encounters. The ship’s figurehead is wrapped in a shroud; Captain Cereno shows no gratitude for being given help on his doomed ship; the slave Atufal is still in chains when others have been released. The tension and sense of menace increase until the moment in the ‘Rover’ that Captain Delano realises what is happening.

Even the events described in the court depositions intensify this atmospheric unity – since they enhance the macabre and grotesque nature of what has taken place aboard the doomed ship.

Unity of character

There are a number of minor named characters in the story – but essentially the whole drama is focussed on three people – Delano, Cereno, and Babo. Captain Delano is the naive, good natured protagonist, seeking to interpret the ambiguities of the world he encounters – and failing to do so at every turn until the truth is finally thrust upon him. Cereno is a good man totally in thrall to an evil power – almost a warning of what Delano’s naivety can lead to if he doesn’t wake up. And Babo is that evil power incarnate. He has been ruthless in taking control of the San Dominick; he has murdered his former ‘owner’, and had his skeleton nailed to the prow with an ironic warning inscribed ‘Follow your leader’. Babo orchestrates events on board the ship, including the menacing shave for Cereno.

The main issue

The event is one from many curious incidents recounted by mariners and others from events at sea. Melville’s work as a novelist draws on many of these recorded events. But these particular events are more than just curious: they embrace large scale political issues. The relationship between America, Europe, and colonialism for instance. America at the time of the story had just fought a war of independence, changing itself from a colony of Britain to an independent state. It had also been engaged in conflicts with England, Spain, and France regarding the slave trade.

The first successful slave uprising had started in San Domingo (now Haiti) in 1791. Slavery was not abolished formally in Great Britain until 1833 and in the USA until 1865, and it is interesting to note that the practice of slavery was first begun in the Spanish colonies around 1500.

So the story does not deal with small scale accidental matters, but forces of great geo-political importance. Benito Cereno, a Spaniard is in charge of a ship whose primary cargo is slaves, ‘owned’ by another Spaniard (Alexandro Aranda).

We do not know where the slaves are from, but it is significant that immediately after seizing control of the San Dominick the rebellion leader Babo wants to be taken back to Senegal – on the west coast of Africa. In other words, he has enough ‘race memory’ to know where he might have originally come from.

Benito Cereno – study resources

Benito Cereno – Oxford World Classics edition

Benito Cereno – Dover Thrift edition

Benito Cereno – Penguin Classics edition

Benito Cereno – Cliffs Notes

Benito Cereno – Norton Critical Editions

Benito Cereno – free eBook formats at Project Gutenberg

Benito Cereno – Kindle eBook edition

Herman Melville at Wikipedia

Benito Cereno – plot summary

Amasa Delano is the good-natured captain of the Bachelor’s Delight, an American sealing ship sailing off the western coast of Chile in 1799. His ship is approached by another, the San Dominick, which is drifting aimlessly and appears like a ghost ship. Delano goes to inspect it and discovers a puzzling state of affairs on board. The captain, Don Benito Cereno appears to be in a state of collapse, there are very few crew members on board, and a cargo of ‘negro slaves’ has been let loose to act in a somewhat menacing fashion.

Benito Cereno explains to Delano that most of the crew were lost during terrible storms at sea, which also damaged the ship; but his explanation doesn’t entirely satisfy Delano, who nevertheless sends his boat back to the Bachelor’s Delight to fetch emergency supplies for the survivors.

Throughout Delano’s visit to the San Dominick, Benito Cereno is accompanied by a very attentive negro servant who never leaves his side. Indeed, he is so solicitous of his master’s wellbeing that Delano at one point offers to buy him for his own use.

Delano continues to be disturbed by the inexplicable goings-on around him – such as a group of slaves who are sharpening hatchets, and Benito Cereno’s lack of thanks for the assistance he is being offered. But Delano repeatedly interprets what he see in a positive and generous light.

When the relief supplies have been distributed, Delano sends the boat back to the Bachelor’s Delight, leaving him alone with the members of the San Dominick. He watches Babo shave Benito Cereno, then dines with them, the servant being present throughout. Delano then takes charge of the San Dominick and steers it towards the Bachelor’s Delight in a safe mooring. He invites Benito Cereno to join him on board for coffee – but Benito Cereno refuses.

When a boat arrives to collect him Delano is still puzzled by Cereno’s coldness and lack of response to a generous offer of help. But when Delano gets into the boat, Cereno suddenly leaps from the San Dominick, closely followed by Babo bearing a knife. Delano is convinced they are going to kill him, but it quickly becomes apparent that Babo intends to kill Benito Cereno.

Babo is seized, they regain the Bachelor’s Delight, and then a party of men sets off and recaptures the San Dominick, which is taken to investigative governmental courts in Lima, Peru.

The second part of the story is a sequence of depositions made to the court which record the true sequence of events regarding the San Dominick and the fate of those on board. Starting with a general revolt of the ‘cargo’ of slaves, Babo and his henchman Atufal take charge and command Benito Cereno to sail for Senegal, which is half way round the other side of the world, in West Africa. Members of the Spanish crew are murdered or thrown alive into the sea.

Alexandro Aranda (the ‘owner’ of the slaves) is murdered, and his skeleton is nailed to the front of the ship as a figurehead. After storms and damage to the ship, they arrive at Santa Maria at the same time as the Bachelor’s Delight. Babo arranges the deceptive appearance on board the San Dominick and threatens everybody on board with instant death if they reveal the truth of what has happened. He even puts Atufal in chains as a deceptive ploy, and plans to seize arms and capture the Bachelor’s Delight.

The tribunal recognises Babo as the principal culprit, and sentences him to death. Benito Cereno retreats to a monastery, where he dies three months later.

Principal characters

Amasa Delano	American captain of the Bachelor’s Delight, a sealing and general trading ship
Don Benito Cereno	young captain of the San Dominick, a first-calss Spanish general trading ship
Babo	former slave and ‘attendant’ to Benito Cereno
Don Alexandro Aranda	‘owner’ of the slave ‘cargo’ on the San Dominick
Atufal	Babo’s assistant, a slave and ‘former king’

Theatrical adaptation

Poster for 1965 play by the poet Robert Lowell

Billy Budd

September 28, 2011 by Roy Johnson

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Billy Budd is the last (and uncompleted) prose work of Herman Melville. In 1856, disenchanted with the sales and critical reception of his novels, he gave up writing fiction and turned instead to poetry (just as Thomas Hardy was to do fifty years later, for slightly different reasons). Melville became, in the words of Robert Milder, ‘a major nineteenth-century poet and a chronicler of the Victorian crisis of belief to be set alongside Arnold, Tennyson, and Browning’. And yet towards the end of his life it was a concentrated prose narrative to which he returned, writing and re-writing Billy Budd, Sailor so many times it was 1962 before the complete and authoritative version of his text could be assembled for publication.

Billy Budd – critical commentary

The text

Billy Budd was started in 1888 and left unfinished by Melville at his death in 1891. In fact the manuscript wasn’t discovered until 1924 by Raymond. Weaver who was working on papers for the Constable edition of Melville’s Complete Works, Then in 1948 a new revised version appeared, and in 1962 there was a complete re-examination of the materials to produce what is now regarded as the definitive text, complete with its full title – Billy Budd, Sailor: An Inside Narrative.

The Novella

The narrative is about 25,000 words long; and it could be regarded as a long short story – but it is almost universally recognised as a novella – because it fulfils many of the criteria for being classed as such. These are mainly a tight focus on unity of time, place, action, and character.

Unity of place

Apart from the opening sections meditating on mutinies and recounting Billy’s transfer from the Rights of Man, almost the whole of the story takes place in one location – on board the Bellipotent.

Unity of action

Once Billy is on board the Bellipotent the essential drama of the story unfolds in more or less one continuous movement. The action of the story is concentrated in an almost Aristotelian manner to produce a single narrative arc. Billy arrives on board, Claggart denounces him, and Vere condemns him to death. Apart from Melville’s quasi-philosophic meditations on the themes of his story, there are no other issues or sub-plots in the narrative.

Unity of atmosphere

The whole of the story takes place against a backdrop of the absolute nature of naval law and the threat of mutiny against its injustices. Melville meditates on two famous episodes in naval history – the revolts at Spithead and the Nore in 1897, the latter of which resulted in hanging of twenty-nine leaders.

Vere faces a moral dilemma as captain of the ship and arbiter of justice, but he evades the moral ambiguities of his position by reverting to a crude interpretation of traditional maritime law. ‘The father in him, manifested towards Billy thus far in the scene, was replaced by the military disciplinarian’. Even before he summons the drumhead court he declares ‘Struck dead by an angel of God! Yet the angel must hang!’

Unity of character

There are a number of minor named characters in the story – but essentially the whole drama is focused on three people – Captain Vere, John Claggart, and Billy Budd.

Captain Vere is kind-hearted and well disposed towards Billy, but when confronted with a choice between humane compassion and the military rule of law, he chooses the latter. He is known as ‘Starry Vere’ because of his dreamy disposition; he is an intellectual, an aristocrat; and as a ship’s captain he has absolute rule. He is therefore in a God-like position of authority over the entire crew.

The text makes it clear that he has the option to delay any proceedings against Billy until rejoining the squadron and reporting the incident to the admiral of the fleet. The senior officers on board agree that this would be the right course of action. But Vere opts for the crude absolute rule of law – and thus precipitates the tragedy.

John Claggart is the embodiment of ‘depravity according to nature’. He encounters Billy, and as his absolute antithesis, immediately takes against him. He accuses him of the worst possible crime in the naval rule book – fomenting mutiny.

Billy is innocent, naively good, young, untainted, and blessed with good looks and a disposition that makes him popular. He is therefore a target of envy to the malicious Claggart. An older, more experienced sailor such as the Dansker knows that such opposing natures will attract each other.

The three characters are locked into an unholy alliance. The spirits of Good and Evil have a God-like character wielding absolute power of decision over their conflict, and the tragedy is precipitated by Vere’s inability to make sufficiently subtle distinctions.

It is easy to see why so many critics have explored the biblical parallels – with Vere the father or God-like figure who has the Satan-like figure of evil present in his sadistic master-at-arms, Claggart. And Billy, the innocent Adam-like figure, must be punished for his transgression of the absolute laws which Vere represents.

Billy Budd – study resources

Billy Budd – Oxford World Classics edition

Billy Budd – Dover Thrift edition

Billy Budd – Penguin Classics edition

Billy Budd – Norton Critical Editions

Billy Budd – free eBook formats at Project Gutenberg

Billy Budd – free audioBook version at Project Gutenberg

Billy Budd – Kindle eBook edition

Billy Budd – Unabridged audio download

Herman Melville at Wikipedia

Billy Budd – film trailer

Peter Ustinov, Terence Stamp and Robert Ryan (1962)

Billy Budd – plot summary

William (Billy) Budd is a handsome and popular young sailor, serving on a merchant ship The Rights of Man. He a great favourite of his ship’s master, Captain Graveling. In 1897 however, Billy is impressed into service on the HMS Bellipotent which is commanded by the aristocratic Edward Fairfax (‘Starry’) Vere. Billy is a figure of innocence and good nature. He is an illiterate foundling (an abandoned and presumably illegitimate child) and is popular with other crew members. But the ship’s master-at-arms John Claggart is fuelled by a malevolent impulse to harm Billy. He reports him to the captain, falsely accusing him of fomenting a mutiny.

When the Captain confronts Billy in front of his accuser and asks for an explanation, Billy becomes tongue-tied. He strikes Claggart with a blow that kills him. Although Captain Vere is well disposed towards Billy, he feels he must uphold the rules of military discipline.

A hurried drumhead ‘court’ is summoned and Vere more or less prejudges its conclusions. Billy is found guilty of assaulting a superior officer, and condemned to death. He is hanged the next morning.

Principal characters

William (Billy) Budd	a 21 year old ‘Handsome Sailor’,
Captain Graveling	the commander of the Rights-ofMan
Edward Fairfax Vere	the commander of HMS Bellipotent
John Claggart	master-at-arms on the Bellipotent
Dansker	veteran Danish sailor

Billy Budd – complete opera version

Benjamin Britain (1951)

The Piazza Tales

August 3, 2011 by Roy Johnson

classic short stories, tales, and novellas

Piazza Tales is a collection of herman Melville’s shorter fiction. He started writing short stories as a desperate commercial venture to provide for his family, following the disastrous reception of Moby Dick on its first publication in 1851. His career as a writer had been in something of a steady decline from the start, and yet as he became less and less successful, he produced the works for which he is now held in the very highest regard – as a great artist who could tap into the fundamentals of the American nineteenth century psyche.

His stories are clouded in ambiguity and steeped in multiple levels of complexity. They have narrators whose intentions are not clear.They are often stories with very little narrative in the normal sense of that term. ‘A Paradise of Bachelors’ is little more than an account of a lavish dinner party in London’s Inns of court related in mock-heroic terms. Its companion piece ‘The Tartarus of Maids’ is the report of a visit to a paper mill.

The narrator of ‘Cock-A-Doodle-Doo!’ is shaken out of a misanthropic mood by the cheerful crowing of a neighbour’s cockerel. But when he eventually decides to buy the bird for its life-affirming powers, its owner dies – and so does the bird.

‘Bartelby the Scrivener’, one of his most famous stories, is startling in its simplicity. An elderly Wall Street solicitor employs a younger man as a clerk to copy legal documents. Bartelby works in complete isolation, and lives on nothing but ginger biscuits, sleeping in the office. But then he stops working, meeting every request to do so with the mantra “I prefer not to”. The solicitor is driven to good-natured despair, and finally has to move office in order to be rid of him. Bartelby is eventually placed in prison where he starves himself – and dies.

Melville’s prose is so allusive, so embedded with metaphors and symbols that it often seems that whilst writing about one thing he is actually talking about another. In ‘I and My Chimney’ for instance a man has a house with an enormous chimney. He takes laboured and curmudgeonly pride in the way it dominates the architecture of the entire building. But his wife, who restlessly devises new schemes for ‘improvement’, wants it pulled down. A struggle takes place between them, which he wins by stubbornly refusing to change his views.

It’s impossible to escape the interpretation that the chimney (and the house itself) represents the narrator’s (and the author’s) psyche, over which he wishes to assert his autonomy. And you don’t need a brass plaque on your front door to realise that it is also a commanding phallic symbol.

This collection includes two of Melville’s most accessible masterpieces. Benito Cereno is his re-telling of a historical incident involving a revolt on board a Spanish slave ship. The tale (a novella) is a study in sustained irony of the most chilling kind. Melville tells the story backwards by describing events as perceived by one ship’s captain when he goes to help the other. Everything he sees is menacing and inexplicable. Only when a disaster is narrowly averted is the reason for and the true horror of these mysterious conditions revealed.

The second novella is Billy Budd another apparently simple story with a naval setting. Billy Budd is a popular young sailor who is impressed into service on a British warship. His good looks and his naivety become the focus of malevolent attention from the ship’s master-at-arms, who falsely reports him to the captain for plotting a mutiny.

When confronted with this accusation, Billy becomes tongue-tied and strikes the master-at-arms with a blow that kills him. The captain is very sympathetic to Billy, but feels compelled to uphold the absolute code of military discipline. Billy is condemned to death and hanged the next morning.

This is a tale that has been interpreted in many ways – the most popular of which is Billy as Adam, fallen from paradise and grace into a cruel world. Claggart, the master-at-arms is seen as the devil or serpent – the embodiment of evil. And the ship’s captain, Vere, as a God-like figure, torn between paternal love and the need to exert justice.

Three of these stories have become landmarks of nineteenth century American literature. All of them are worth reading – and there is an added bonus, Melville has an amazingly rich prose style which combines a rich vocabulary, a slightly archaic form of syntax, and an amazingly flexible narrative voice in which he thinks out loud, talks to his characters, asks himself questions, and speculates freely about the very stories he is telling.

Buy the book at Amazon UK

Buy the book at Amazon US

Herman Melville, Billy Budd, Sailor and Selected Tales, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009, pp.410, ISBN: 0199538913

More on literature
More on the novella
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Benito Cereno

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Benito Cereno – critical commentary

Benito Cereno – study resources

Benito Cereno – plot summary

Principal characters

Theatrical adaptation

Further reading

Billy Budd

tutorial, commentary, study resources, and web links

Billy Budd – critical commentary

Billy Budd – study resources

Billy Budd – film trailer

Billy Budd – plot summary

Principal characters

Billy Budd – complete opera version

Further reading

The Piazza Tales

classic short stories, tales, and novellas

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