'Call me Ishmael.' So begins Herman Melville's masterpiece, one of the greatest works of imagination in literary history. As Ishmael is drawn into Captain Ahab's obsessive quest to slay the white whale Moby-Dick, he finds himself engaged in a metaphysical struggle between good and evil. More than just a novel of adventure, more than an paean to whaling lore and legend, Moby-Dick is a haunti…
tung by the critical reception and lack of commercial success of his previous two works, Moby-Dick and Pierre, Herman Melville became obsessed with the difficulties of communicating his vision to readers. His sense of isolation lies at the heart of these later works. "Billy Budd, Sailor," a classic confrontation between good and evil, is the story of an innocent young man unable to defend himse…
An omnibus edition of four of America's most influential and thought-provoking novels includes The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage, and Billy Budd by Herman Melville. Reprint. An adulteress, a runaway boy, a terrified soldier, and a maltreated sailor-all the heroes of these must-read novels have beco…
From the time she is sent to pick up the guest conductor, Amelia Bedelia's normal confusion causes quite an uproar at the school concert.'