Through a minute reconsideration of Hawthorne, Poe and Melville,
Harry Levin traces the ever mysterious problem of good and evil. If
this seems to be a hackneyed subject, Professor Levin does manage
to pour a few drops of new wine into the old bottles. He has
examined the works of these old masters lovingly and closely,
almost too closely for the glaring fault of this text in its
wordiness. His examination of Hawthorne is perhaps the most
successful, it is delicate and perceptive. But perhaps Hawthorne of
these three writers is the easiest to analyze, the most classical,
the least paradoxical. In the end he made a successful adjustment
to life and marriage...Poe remains the most enigmatic; no one, as
yet, has had final insights into Poe's complex background and
nature. He was doubtless doomed from the beginning, given his
ill-fated childhood... And Melville's answers are so paradoxical
and ambiguous, the very course of his greatness, since he had no
easy answers, that any analysis of his works necessarily pursues a
zig-zag course. This is a work of scholarship and perception but it
has neither brilliance nor challenge, though he is almost alone in
going against the general American optimism, pragmatism and
utilitarianism. This belongs chiefly on university bookshelves, to
be read by scholars and students of literature. (Kirkus Reviews)
The Power of Blackness is a profound and searching reinterpretation
of Hawthorne, Poe and Melville, the three classic American masters
of fiction. It is also an experiment in critical method, an
exploration of the myth-making process by way of what may come to
be known as literary iconology.
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