Cereno is constantly attended by Babo, his young black servant. Discussion Questions Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book: • How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips) • Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction • Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart) Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for both "Bartleby the Scrivener" and "Benito Cereno": For real, this scene is a great example of Melville's dark exploration of his characters' psyches. Delano orders his crew back to his own ship to get supplies, then tries to figure out what's happened to the San Dominick. This was fired six times, without any other effect than cutting away the fore top-mast stay, and some other small ropes which were no hindrance to her going away. This is an early indication of the narrator's unreliability and close connection with Delano, as it becomes clear throughout the narrative that this is also how Delano sees himself. Narrator, Section 1 (Benito Cereno's Story) In this early introduction to Captain Amasa Delano, the reader is told by the narrator that Delano is extremely good-natured. [12], Scholar Rosalie Feltenstein finds it "far from accurate" to say that he found his story ready-made in his source,[13] a statement not just contradicted by Scudder's own inventory of alterations, but instead of suppressing only "a few items," Melville in fact "omits the whole second half of the narrative. Delano precedes the two out of the cuddy and walks to the mainmast, where Babo joins him, complaining that Cereno cut his cheek in reproach for his carelessness even though Cereno’s own shaking caused the cut. While anchored, the crew spots another ship coming toward the island. Contextualizing events and observations in varying conditions Story of “The Piazza” as a metaphor for this theme (pg. Historian Sterling Stuckey finds it unjust to restrict attention to chapter 18, because Melville used elements from other chapters as well. In "Benito Cereno," the narrator is Amasa Delano, the captain of a Massachusetts whaling ship. Second, Melville replaces the names Perseverance and Tryal by names of his own literary invention, Bachelor's Delight and San Dominick,[note 1] respectively. [49], Other critics regard Melville's alteration of the year of events from 1799 to 1805, the Christopher Columbus motif, and the name of the San Dominick as allusions to the French colony then known as Saint-Domingue, called Santo Domingo in Spanish, one of the first landing places of Columbus. Ironically, the ragged Babo looked "something like a begging friar of Saint Francis." Over time, Melville's story has been "increasingly recognized as among his greatest achievements".[2]. Gradually, his suspicions increase as he notes Cereno's sudden waves of dizziness and anxiety, the crew's awkward movements and hushed talks, and the unusual interaction of the slaves and the crew. He boards the ship, and he is immediately accosted by sailors and black slaves, all begging for water and supplies. Delano is disturbed by the incidents he observes among the hatchet polishers and oakum pickers, such as when a black boy slashes the head of a white boy with a knife. It is unclear whether the nick is caused by a sudden wave on the sea, or "a momentary unsteadiness of the servant’s hand." [27], With regard to Melville’s choice to implement a third-person narration, John Bryant believes that no first-person narrator was used because it would have made the suspense hard to sustain, as first-person narrators "too easily announce their limitations. Delano decides to send a boat over to investigate.

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