Books : Pierre: or, The Ambiguities (Penguin Classics)
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by: Herman Melville
List Price: $15.00Amazon.com's Price: $13.50 You Save: $1.50 (10%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.3
EAN: 9780140434842
ISBN: 0140434844
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: January 01, 1996
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Sales Rank: 517958
Studio: Penguin Classics
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
HarperCollins is proud to present this controversial masterpiece of American literature, now restored to its original form and illuminated with 30 full-color pictures by Maurice Sendak.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - Melville's Landlocked Novel of Manners
It's hard to enjoy Pierre. The style is reminiscent of the effect of perfume on a seasick sailor. I can't say that I enjoyed it myself, nor can I make much of a case for its significance in a world rather well-stocked with significant books. I'd urge any reader to use her/his reading lifetime judiciously by 'perusing' all of Melville's other novels and tales first. But there are some people who admire Pierre; the review here on Amazon, by D. Cloyce Smith, makes as good a case for the novel as any ... Read More
Rating:  - Ambiguities indeed!
I found this to be a much better Book Club selection than just a classic read. It is the tragic story of a young man who is naive in the world and his life quickly dissipates into ruin. Herman Melville published this novel a year after Moby Dick. I would not necessarily recommend it, but I thought it was an interesting work, especially if you are interested in the career of Melville.
Rating:  - Rich Chocolaty Goodness
The thing about Bartleby, the Scrivener is that it makes you want to read everything else Melville wrote. Right now I'm about half way through Pierre; or, The Ambiguities and think it an immensely satisfying layer cake so far. When I'm finished I hope to go fishing. Apropos of which, great bolshy yarblockos to Clifton Fadiman, who wrote the following paragraph in an introduction to Moby Dick round about 1941:
"A pessimism as profound as Melville's, if not pathological--and his was not ... Read More
Rating: - Adultery, incest, madness, murder, and suicide--all in "a narrative nervous breakdown"
"Pierre" is perhaps Melville's most difficult and challenging novel--and that's saying something. Despairing over his inability to support his family, Melville began writing a book designed to be popular--a counterpoint to the sensational novels written and read by contemporary women, using inspiration from French romances and even from Hawthorne's novels. Wavering between psychological melodrama and social satire, Melville ultimately increased the book's length by half again, incorporating his rage ... Read More
Rating: - A mild disclaimer " I didn't get it"
This complicated,work so full of ambiguity and difficulty in language and style is one I have found almost unreadable. The broad spaces and the great ranging adventurous mind of Melville in Moby Dick(The work which preceded this and in which all of Melville's writing climaxed) is followed by a claustrophic, domestic drama which seems to go nowhere.
My sense many other people have a more generous attitude towards this work, than I do and understand it more deeply.
As my old high- school ... Read More
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