The Passages of H.M.: A Novel of Herman Melville ~ Paperback ~ Axinn Professor of English Jay Parini (Middlebury College)

With the same masterly touch that made "The Last Station" so powerful, Jay Parini penetrates the mind and soul of another literary titan. Through the eyes of his long-suffering wife, Lizzie, we are introduced to an aging, angry, and drunken Herman Melville. He is decades past his flourishing career as a writer of bestselling tales of seagoing adventures. His epic but ungainly "Moby-Dick" was meant to make him immortal, but critics scoffed and readers fled. He spends his days trudging the docks of New York as a customs inspector and contemplating his malign literary fate. But within him is stirring, perhaps, one great work yet. . . . In a narrative that shifts seamlessly between Lizzie's personal account and evocative snapshots of Melville's crowded life, Parini manages to humanize a giant of letters, while illuminating the source of his matchless creativity.Author BiographyJay Parini is a poet, biographer, and critic who has published seven novels, most notably "The Last Station," which was made into an Academy Award-nominated film in 2009 and translated into over twenty-five languages. He is the D. E. Axinn Professor of English and Creative Writing at Middlebury College, and the author of "Promised Land: Thirteen Books that Changed America."