1994 / 1 Prospero. Rivista di culture anglo-germaniche

The reference to Cervantes’s masterpiece is meant to evoke one of the most powerful incarnations of the hero as reader and author in Western literature. The protagonist of Herman Melville’s "Pierre or The Ambiguities" (1852) is a sort of a cousin of Don Quixote. It is worth devoting some attention to the particular climate in which this novel was conceived, published and received. Not only did the book prove to be very unpopular, but it was rebuffed with unusual violence and animosity by almost all contemporary reviewers. It is undeniable that some of the themes Melville chose to address in "Pierre", such as his unmasking of the dark face of family relationships or his observations on the value of Christianity, are daring and may appear to be deliberately provoking and shocking rather than calculated for popularity. What made the book particularly unappealing to the majority of readers was its anti-moral; it represented to them something new and astonishing, that is to say crude and vulgar.