Billy Budd, Foretopman (Masterplots, Revised Second Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Herman Melville
- First Published: 1924
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Symbolic realism
- Time of Work: 1797
- Setting: Aboard a British man-of-war
- Principal Characters: Billy Budd, Captain Vere, Claggart
- Genres: Long fiction
- Subjects: Eighteenth century
- Locales: Oceans
The Story:
In 1797, the British merchant ship Rights-of-Man, named after the famous reply of Thomas Paine to Edmund Burke’s criticism of the French Revolution, was close to home after a long voyage. As it neared England, the merchant vessel was stopped by a man-of-war, HMS Indomitable, and an officer from the warship went aboard the Rights-of-Man to impress sailors for military service. This practice was necessary at the time to provide men to work the large number of ships that Britain had at sea for protection against the French.
The captain of...
[The entire page is 3290 words long]
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