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Abstract |
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To Melville,to write was his gsubstitute for pistol and ballhjust as gto get to seahwas to Ishmael,the narrator
of Moby-Dick. Melville wrote from the very beginning of his literary career,what lies behind the specious good or
evil, always seeking the truth behind the deceptive appearances of the world and people.
In his first novel Typee, Melville severely criticized the 19th century Christian civilization of the white race in explicit language,describing the vices inflicted by the civilized white race upon the innocent natives of the Polynesian islands. He contends that the natives were not at all savages in the beginning but the invasions and enormities perpetrated by the white race in the name of Christian civilization made the natives savages.His final say was gthe white civilized manhwas gthe most ferocious animal on the face of the earth.h
Melvillefs denunciations of the White Christian civilization were symbolized in the characters and stage settings
of Moby-Dick with the white whale in the center. The white whale can be a symbol of many a thing depending on
the readerfs viewpoint,but apparently it is a symbol of the White Christian civilization when it is reviewed through the reading of Typee. |
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