Northwestern UP Catalog MELVILLE BIOGRAPHY: AN INSIDE NARRATIVE

There is a fourth part to the book that may interest anyone concerned with biography in general, not just Melville biography. The endnotes constitute a symposium in which views of many biographers, most often British, are tested against Parker's experiences with Melville. Topics include theories which relate biography to fiction, invasions of privacy by biographers, the idea that the biographer enacts a kind of counter-transference, the recklessness of the "Brainstorm" site of the Chronicle of Higher Education,the problem of gaps in evidence, the constrictive power of prior knowledge, the importance of working in small "time-spans," the New Critical faith in the sanctity of texts, the folly of seizing on one determinative turning-point, the redefining of archives out of existence, the question of suitable tone and language, strategies for not confusing fiction with autobiography, the occasional necessity to make "exposition simulate narrative," the serendipitous finding something significant while looking for something else, the seeming "fact" which undercuts an elaborate theory, the specter of the rival biographer, the group therapy that occurs when biographers talk about reviewers, the folly of seeking the "essence" of one's subject. By listening to the voices of dozens of biographers excitedly describing their working methods, their obstacles, and their triumphs, Parker makes his inside narrative an essential resource for biographers and students of biography.

The Index is a full, meticulous guide to the players in Melville biography and the issues that have dominated Melville biography. Recently some prominent academic presses have stopped including names and concepts in Endnotes in the index, but MELVILLE BIOGRAPHY: AN INSIDE NARRATIVE very carefully includes both sorts of references in the index so that skirmishes and bloody battles among biographers of Melville and other writers are highlighted along with areas of agreement. Even for readers not especially interested in Melville or Melville biography the endnotes constitute a fascinating, accessible guide to what has been going on in the theory and practice of biography in the last half century and more.