Benito Cereno; Billy Budd, sailor; Bartleby, the Scrivener

This book contains 3 stories: "Bartleby The Scrivener", "Benito Cereno", and "Billy Budd". About a half of the book is "contexts", which are essays about the stories and other texts that shed light on the three stories. For the scholar, this book is probably the best edition around as far as the "Killer B's" are concerned (Bartleby, Benito, Billy Budd). It contains excellent criticism, and has a neat bibliography which any... Read Full Review

In each of these works Melville creates and probes deeply into a complex world of difficult and mysterious human relationships. This is even true in 'Bartleby' the story of the great solitary scrivener who at one point 'prefers not to' do the work he is hired for. The story of Bartleby is the great American parallel to Dostoevsky's 'Notes from the Underground' It is the man who revolts against the urban mass pressing against... Read Full Review

This book includes both the text of Melville's short works (Bartleby, Benito Cereno, and Billy Budd)-approx 175 pages, and approx 225 pages of contexts (which are just what they sound like, historical background regarding each work, something I find invaluable when reading books written long before I was born) and literary criticism (generally interesting and almost always opened my eyes to new layers of meaning in Melville's... Read Full Review