Pierre in Utica

Hon. Ellis H. Roberts, M.C.
via The New York Public Library Digital Collections

Somehow I overlooked this friendly notice of Pierre in the Oneida Morning Herald, then published and edited in Utica, New York by Ellis H. Roberts. A few months later (October 26, 1852), the Utica editor protested the "ferocious diatribe on Herman Melville" in the November 1852 American Whig Review as "the most unjust specimen of criticism we have read during the past five years."

From the Oneida Morning Herald (Utica, New York), Thursday, August 5, 1852; found at Fulton History:

Oneida Morning Herald (Utica, NY) - August 5, 1852

PIERRE, or the Ambiguities. By Herman Melville, New York: Harper & Brothers.

Another work by the author of "Typee!" Those who have read the earlier as well as some of the later productions of this author, need no importuning of ours to read the present volume. We must confess the story of Pierre is to us as yet a profound mystery; but the dozen or so pages which we have read tempt us so strongly to proceed that we have made a vow to read the book as soon as we shall get sufficient breathing time. "Pierre" is dedicated to our old friend, "His Purple Majesty, Greylock," and he could not have enlisted the favor of a more lordly patron.

For sale by John W. Fuller & Co. 

Still looking for any notice of Moby-Dick in Utica.

Related posts:

• Mardi in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/favorable-review-of-mardi-in-oneida.html
• Redburn in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/redburn-in-oneida-morning-herald.html
• White-Jacket in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2014/02/melville-no-mawkish-philanthropist.html
• Ellis H Roberts protests ferocious diatribe in Whig Review
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/ellis-henry-roberts-protests-ferocious.html
  

Redburn in the Oneida Morning Herald

Time to tidy up. We already located favorable notices of Mardi (1849) and White-Jacket (1850) by editors Richard U. Sherman and Erastus Clark, so there pretty much has to be one of Redburn (1849), too, somewhere in the Morning Herald. Here:

Oneida Morning Herald [Utica, New York] - November 22, 1849

Herman Melville, the author of those exquisite creations Typee and Omoo has just published another work. "Redburn, His first voyage being the sailor boy Confession's of a Gentleman's Son in the Merchant service. We have not had time to peruse it yet we have no doubt that the same humor, clearness and minuteness of observation, the same fancy at all times pleasant and oftentimes highly exalted, and a like chaste style which mark his first productions are the properties of "Redburn." 

This work can be had at TRACY's.

Related posts:

• Mardi in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/favorable-review-of-mardi-in-oneida.html
• White-Jacket in the Oneida Morning Herald https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2014/02/melville-no-mawkish-philanthropist.html
• Pierre in Utica
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2019/08/pierre-in-utica.html
• Ellis H Roberts protests ferocious diatribe in Whig Review
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/ellis-henry-roberts-protests-ferocious.html

Favorable review of Mardi in the Oneida Morning Herald

"There is manifested a wide range of learning, a bold originality of thought, an exuberant fancy, and a figurative sprightliness which could not fail of imparting interest to any work."

This notice is in Herman Melville: The Contemporary Reviews, ed. Brian Higgins and Hershel Parker (Cambridge University Press, 1995), page 230. From the Oneida Morning Herald, May 26, 1849; now accessible online via Fulton History:

MARDI: And a Voyage Thither.—By Herman Melville. In two volumes. Harper & Brothers, 82 Cliff street, New York, 1849.

This third work of Mr. Melville's sufficiently evinces that his former works, Typee and Omoo, were no fictions. When, as in this instance, the author confessedly enters the field of romance, although he carries with him many of his former charming characteristics, it is easily perceived that he is dealing with very different materials—is in quite another element.

Mardi has many excellencies, as is sufficiently evinced by the attention which it receives from the critics. Its conception indicates no stinted genius or want of artistic talent. There is manifested a wide range of learning, a bold originality of thought, an exuberant fancy, and a figurative sprightliness which could not fail of imparting interest to any work. In most of these respects it surpasses Mr. Melville's former productions. They need the power of the mental crucible to fuse them into a harmonious whole. This, and what sometimes appears like straining after effect, with perhaps a little ultraism of opinion, are almost its only faults. Its excellencies will win for it many admirers.

Published in Utica, New York, the Oneida Morning Herald was co-edited then by Richard Updike Sherman and Erastus Clark. Their highly complimentary review of White-Jacket in the Oneida Morning Herald for April 6, 1850, is transcribed in the 2014 melvilliana post linked below:

• Melville no mawkish philanthropist.

Related posts:

• Redburn in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/redburn-in-oneida-morning-herald.html
• White-Jacket in the Oneida Morning Herald https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2014/02/melville-no-mawkish-philanthropist.html
• Pierre in Utica
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2019/08/pierre-in-utica.html
• Ellis H Roberts protests ferocious diatribe in Whig Review
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/ellis-henry-roberts-protests-ferocious.html

Melville "no mawkish philanthropist": White-Jacket reviewed in Utica

From the Oneida Morning Herald (Utica, New York), Saturday Morning, April 6, 1850:

White Jacket.—The Navy.

We gave a brief notice of this work a few days ago. Since then we have read it with great interest, and the perusal has induced us to give it a more extended comment. Herman Melville stands in the front rank of American authors, and in those characteristics where lie his chief excellencies, has few living superiors in English literature on either continent. The purity and directness of his style, the interest, the charm which he throws around all matters he touches, in the hands of other men dull and heavy, the lifelikeness of the pictures he draws, whether of man, the works of man’s hands, or the works of nature, give him place with those authors whose simplicity and naturalness have made their intellectual children immortal. We did not commence this notice for the purpose of complimenting Melville’s powers. Little good can we do a man whose fame is rapidly making its way through all civilization. Our object was a different one.

There are movements making in various parts of the country for the suppression of “flogging in the navy.” Our ignorance as to the necessity or non necessity of flogging for the support of discipline, as well as the fact that under the pretence of philanthropy a thousand absurd and impracticable projects are started in these times, had prevented us from taking any particular interest in the mission of Mr. Holmes. The perusal of White Jacket has done much to enlist strongly our sympathies. It is a story of months of service on a man of war. Its descriptions are truthful even when most painful, and its comments are richly deserved even when most stern.

Herman Melville is no mawkish philanthropist spending his sympathies on criminals and vice, no quack reformer, seeking notoriety by loud professions of humanity and bitter abuse of all who will not adopt his crazy nostrums. He is a clear-headed, large-hearted, impartial delineator of what he saw and of which he was a part. He does not draw vivid contrasts for the purpose of a sensation. He does not present on the one side nought but humble, suffering virtue, and on the other nought but tyrannous depravity. He makes all classes appear just as they are. He holds the scales fairly between private and officer. But he holds up to severe condemnation the multiplied abuses of the American navy. He spares nothing which deserves rebuke. No dignitary on the quarter deck so exalted as to be above his honest lash, no private in the waist so humble as to be beneath his justice.

If what is here set down is true, and no one can doubt it, there is nothing on land or sea that calls louder for reform than a man of war; a reform of course characterized by sound judgment. If Herman Melville has stated facts, a frigate of this Republic deserves the epithet given it by sailors, “a hell afloat.” Mr. Melville does not despise discipline, or the means necessary to secure it, but he lays the axe at the root of the discipline enforced by the articles of war, and by the self-sufficient jealousies and spites of the officers. In our judgment he treats the whole matter not only like a man but like a philosopher. His opinion is worth that of a thousand interested witnesses.

We are glad that for once a gentleman and a scholar, who could appreciate and make allowance for all circumstances, and yet who had a soul to hate and a courage to expose abuses, found himself in the maintop of an American frigate. This work will accomplish good. We hope every one will peruse it. It appeals more to the judgment than to the feelings.—Hence its chief moral beauty, and, the safety with which it can be trusted. It can be had at TRACY’s, also at BEESLEY’s.

(Found at Old Fulton NY Post Cards)

 Related posts:

• Mardi in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/favorable-review-of-mardi-in-oneida.html
• Redburn in the Oneida Morning Herald
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/redburn-in-oneida-morning-herald.html
• Pierre in Utica
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2019/08/pierre-in-utica.html
• Ellis H Roberts protests ferocious diatribe in Whig Review
  https://melvilliana.blogspot.com/2017/08/ellis-henry-roberts-protests-ferocious.html