Word: cereno
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Benito Cereno, Herman Melville's parable about slavery, the moody, vaguely ailing captain of a Spanish slave ship is asked: "What has cast such a shadow upon you?" He replies simply: "The Negro." In the long aftershadow of centuries, that answer, says James Pope-Hennessy, still holds true...
Natural Arena. Styron calls The Confessions of Nat Turner not a historical novel but a "meditation on histo ry." There are echoes in it of Melville's Benito Cereno, a tale of a Negro slave rebellion at sea. Like Melville, Styron is fascinated by the evil of slavery and its inevitable connection with violence and corruption. The novels of the Puritanical giants of the 19th century were propelled by the driving force of implacable fate; so is Nat Turner. But here Styron makes his own departure. In Melville, Hawthorne and Twain, there is always at least a memory...