To celebrate America’s semiquincentennial this July – the 250th anniversary of the United States Declaration of Independence – The Folio Society recently asked their readers to answer the timeless question, “What is the Great American Novel?”
One book rose above the rest receiving a total 1,281 out of 4,823 votes: Herman Melville’s epic tale of obsession and vengeance, MOBY-DICK.
The Folio Society Celebrates 175 Years Of Herman Melville’s Masterpiece
Just in time for the 175th anniversary of the novel’s first release, Folio will now publish a landmark limited edition of Melville’s magnum opus, featuring a new introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Michael Dirda and striking illustrations by renowned artist Mu Pan.
The Folio Society edition of MOBY-DICK is set to be as wondrous and wildly imaginative as it was when it first published in 1851.
Once the results of the poll were in, Folio devoted itself to crafting a book worthy of Melville’s text. Every detail of this limited edition captures the elemental power of the novel, from the full leather binding to the gun-metal foiled edges to the inset label of Captain Ahab’s great white whale, blocked with harpoons and other details.
Pan’s full-color illustrations are luminous and dreamlike, plunging readers into a world of roiling seas and shattering shipwrecks.
At once an adventure story on the high seas and an exploration of the uncharted regions of the soul, MOBY-DICK is an undoubtedly American treasure and a perfect celebration of the USA’s Semiquincentennial.
The Extraordinary Life Of Herman Melville
Herman Melville was born in 1819 in New York City to wealthy parents of New English and Dutch origin. When his father died bankrupt, Melville left school, aged 12, to work as a bank clerk. He attended night school and became a teacher before signing on as a merchant seaman. In 1841, he boarded the whaling ship Acushnet.
After a year and a half, Melville jumped ship and spent a month among a tribe in the Marquesas Islands, before making his way home via Hawaii and Peru.
In New York, he published several novels, to instant success. His meeting with Nathaniel Hawthorne in 1850, while he was writing MOBY-DICK, was a pivotal moment and filled him with inspiration. The novel’s reception was mixed, and his following novel Pierre was a failure.
Melville’s reputation faded, and his later years were shadowed by his son’s suicide and his own ill-health. He worked as an inspector in the New York Customs House for nearly 20 years until his death in 1891.
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