Harper ads quoting London reviews of The Whale

In January 1852, Harper ads in New York City briefly quoted three British reviews of The Whale. One of these, the mixed review in the London Atlas (First Notice, November 1, 1851), was also excerpted with a positive spin in the January 1852 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. Along with the Atlas, the Harpers quoted the London Leader (November 8, 1851) and Literary Gazette (December 6, 1851). A different, longer excerpt from the Leader showed up in Harper's magazine for April 1852. Herman Melville's brother Allan knew the whole Leader review, as Hershel Parker relates in Herman Melville: A Biography Volume 2, 1851-1891 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002) pages 99-100. And reminds in a comment on the Melvilliana post, Moby-Dick widely praised.

These particular London blurbs do seem underwhelming next to the most appreciative and insightful British responses we know about now, for example in the London Morning Advertiser, Morning Post, Weekly News and Chronicle, and Daily News.

The Leader review first glossed The Whale as "a strange, wild weird book, full of poetry and full of interest." But the Harper ad skips the weirdness and poetry. Instead, the text of the Leader blurb has been clipped and combined from bits of another passage, describing Melville's Whale as

"a strange, wild work, with the tangled overgrowth and luxuriant vegetation of American forests, not the trim orderliness of an English park. Criticism may pick many holes in this work; but no criticism will thwart its fascination."

The compressed Leader text still anticipates and answers negative criticism, without getting specific:

"A strange, wild work--no criticism will thwart its fascination." 

On the bright side, the Morning Courier and New-York Enquirer and The Literary World supplemented the London quotations with very high praise from the Washington, DC National Intelligencer ("actually Shakspearean") and New York Tribune (for "the author's originality and power"). In the Literary World for January 17, 1852 the full page ad for "HARPER & BROTHERS' LATEST PUBLICATIONS" listed "MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE" as the sixth of nine new works.

The Literary World - January 17, 1852 - page 60

VI.

MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE

By HERMAN MELVILLE. 

12mo. muslin, $1 50.  

"A prose Epic on Whaling. Mr. Melville's delineations of character are actually Shakspearean—a quality which is even more prominently evinced In 'Moby Dick' than in any of his antecedent efforts." —National Intelligencer. 

"Nothing like it has ever before been written of the Whale." —Literary World. 

"It gives us a higher opinion of the author's originality and power than even the fragrant and first fruits of his genius, the never to be forgotten 'Typee.' " —N. York Tribune.  

"A strange, wild work—no criticism will thwart its fascination." —Lond, Leader.

"Equal to anything we have ever met with" — London Literary Gazette. 

"That Herman Melville knows more about whales than any from Jonah down, we do really believe."—London Atlas. 

https://books.google.com/books?id=XjwZAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA60&lpg#v=onepage&q&f=false>

Below, the same ad in the New York Courier and Enquirer. In the quote from the National Intelligencer, William A. Butler's word "Shakespearean" is spelled "Shaksperean"; the Literary World version has it "Shakspearean" on January 17 but "Shakspearian" on February 14, 1852.

Morning Courier and New-York Enquirer - January 8, 1852
via FultonHistory

MOBY DICK; OR THE WHALE.

By Herman Melville. 12mo, muslin, $1.50.

"A prose Epic on Whaling. Mr. Melville's delineations of character is actually Shaksperean--a quality which is even more prominently evinced in "Moby-Dick" than in any of his antecedent efforts." --National Intelligencer.

"Nothing like it has ever before been written of the Whale." --Literary World. 

 "It gives us a higher opinion of the author's originality and power than even the fragrant and first fruits of his genius, the never to be forgotten 'Typee.' --N. Y. Tribune. 

"A strange, wild work--no criticism will thwart its fascination." --London Leader.

"Equal to anything we have ever met with." --London Literary Gazette.

"That Herman Melville knows more about whales than any man from Jonah down, we do really believe." --London Atlas. 

Thursday, January 8, 1852 is the first day the new Harper & Brothers ad ran in the Morning Courier and New-York Enquirer. On the previous day, January 7th, the Harper ad for Moby-Dick contained only one quotation--from the London Times review of Typee.

Morning Courier and New-York Enquirer - January 7, 1852
via FultonHistory

The Harper & Brothers ad in the New York Evening Post on January 17, 1852 features the three new quotations from London reviews of The Whale, but no American blurbs.

New York Evening Post - January 17, 1852
via GenealogyBank

In February the Harper ad for Moby-Dick in the Literary World provided a different selection of London quotes. The revised ad drops the Leader and Literary Gazette texts, while substituting a juicier quotation from the London Atlas, and adding a new one from the otherwise negative notice in the London Examiner. The Valentine's Day 1852 version keeps the high praise of Moby-Dick from major American newspapers the New York Tribune and Washington National Intelligencer, but omits the previously included endorsement from the first Literary World review ("Nothing like it has ever before been written of the Whale"). Transcribed below from the New York Literary World, February 14, 1852, page 128:

The Literary World - February 14, 1852 - page 128

Moby Dick;
Or, The Whale. By HERMAN MELVILLE. 12mo. Muslin, $1 50. 

"It gives us a higher opinion of the author's originality and power than even the fragrant and first-fruits of his genius, the never-to-be forgotten 'Typee.'" —New York Tribune. 

"A prose Epic on whaling. His delineation of character is actually Shakspearian —a quality which is even more prominently evinced in 'Moby Dick' than in any of his antecedent efforts."—National Intelligencer.  

"Fully and freely is the book to be commended to all who are curious in such matters." —London Examiner. 

"Herman Melville plunges among the whales as if he loved them, and counted them the grandest and most glorious of the creatures of the globe. Upon the whale, its mysteries and its terrors, he dwells as if the subject had enchantment for him." —London Atlas.

https://books.google.com/books?pg=PA128&lpg=&id=XjwZAAAAYAAJ#v=onepage&q&f=false