Billy Budd is a 1924 mezzobula, a book that is too long to be a short story and to short to be a novel, by American author Herman Melville. - AsNotedIn
IN THE time before steamships, or then more frequently than now, a stroller along the docks of any considerable sea-port would occasionally have his attention arrested by a group of bronzed mariners, man-of-war's men or merchant-sailors in holiday attire ashore on liberty. In certain instances they would flank, or, like a body-guard quite surround some superior figure of their own class, moving along with them like Aldebaran among the lesser lights of his constellation. That signal object was the "Handsome Sailor" of the less prosaic time alike of the military and merchant navies. With no perceptible trace of the vainglorious about him, rather with the off-hand unaffectedness of natural regality, he seemed to accept the spontaneous homage of his shipmates. A somewhat remarkable instance recurs to me.Billy Budd, Herman Melville
| Y/M/D | Association | Description | Place | Locale | Food | Event | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1886/00/00 | Herman Melville | Author | Early in 1886, when Melville took up, or perhaps began, the work that became Billy Budd, he had in mind neither the plot of a novel nor any one of the characters as they later emerged in the course of his writing. - Hayford and Sealts, 1962 | ||||
| 1887/00/00 | Herman Melville | Author | During the first two years of retirement, Melville constructs a narrative about Billy Budd, 1886-1887. | ||||
| 1888/12/00 | A third and final phase of development ..., when Melville set out (not for the first time) to put his story into fair-copy form. - Hayford and Sealts, 1962 | ||||||
| 1891/00/00 | The manuscript of Billy Budd as Melville left it at his death in 1891 may be most accurately described as a semi-final draft, not a final fair copy ready for publication. - Hayford and Sealts, 1962 | ||||||
| 1924/00/00 | A Constable and Co | Publisher | Edited by Raymond M Weaver, a professor at Columbia University, "Billy Budd, Sailor" by Herman Melville is published posthumously by Constable and Co LTD, London, Bombay, Sydney. | ||||
| 1948/00/00 | "Melville's Billy Budd" edited by F Barron Freeman is published. It is the first effort to establish a "definitive text" based upon a study of the manuscript currently in the Houghton Library at Harvard. | Houghton Library, Harvard | Cambridge, MA | ||||
| 1962/00/00 | Herman Melville | Author | "Billy Budd" edited by Harrison Hayford and Merton M Sealts Jr is published by the University of Chicago Press. After several years of studying the original manuscript, Hayford and Sealts assembled what is now considered the correct, authoritative text. | Houghton Library, Harvard | Cambridge, MA |
| Particulars for Billy Budd (book): | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Era | Age of Sail | A period where trade and naval warfare were dominated by sailing ships, lasting from the mid-16C to the mid-19C. | |
| Art Type | Book | a written or printed work consisting of pages glued or sewn together along one side and bound in covers. | |
| Narrative Arts | Fiction | prose literature, especially short stories and novels, that describes imaginary events and people | |
| Narrative Arts | Mezzobula | medium form fiction narrative that is longer than a short story, but shorter than a novel | |
| Narrative Arts | Narrative | an account of connected events | |
| Narrative Arts | Prose | ordinary written language | |
| Information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Original Language: | English | ||
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