Melville's "Benito Cereno"

Abstract

S INCE ITS FIRST PUBLICATION in installments by Putnam's Monthly Magazine in I855 and its inclusion in The Piazza Tales in I856; Benito Cereno either has' been ignored by critics of Melville or has received inadequate treatment. In Athenaeum for July 26, i856, contemporary reviewer dismissed all of The Piazza Tales as something for a very young public, since elder folk, however tolerant of imagery, and alive to seductions of color will lay aside such rhapsody and raving in favour of something more temperate.' Many of later critics have really been much more discerning in their appraisals of story. Carl Van Vechten says, rather mysteriously, that Benito Cereno is sea story which should be better than is,2 and Van Wyck Brooks catalogues as simple, objective tale, merely the story of mutiny on South American ship.3 Lewis Mumford thinks is such tale as one might hear, with good luck, during gam in South Seas or at bar in Callao.4 With an apology for once having called story not markedly original, Carl Van Doren places Melville's shorter works among the most original and distinguished fiction produced on this continent, but has much more to say of Benito Cereno than that it equals best of Conrad in weight of its drama and skill of its unfolding.5 John Freeman shows enthusiasm but tells nothing about story itself when he calls a flaming instance of author's pure genius . . . which must have brought tears of pride to Melville's eyes as he looked back upon it.6