The Life of Herman Melville

Herman Melville was a gifted novelist, essayist, poet, and short story writer. Melville was best known for Moby Dick, a story he dedicated to his literary inspiration, Nathaniel Hawthorne. Melville lived an adventurous life. This is a little about the life of Herman Melville.

Herman Melville was born on August 1, 1819 in New York City. He was the third of eight children, born to Allen and Maria Melville. His grandfather, Major Thomas Melville, was a survivor of the Boston Tea Party, and well known for his refusal to change the person he was to fit the times. His grandfather, on his mother's side, was known for being a hero of The Saratoga Campaign. This campaign ended the first major British defeat of the American War For Independence. Melville talked about both sides of his family in his books, he was very proud to be from two such diverse backgrounds.

Herman Melville's dad, Allen, was in need of a change, so he moved the family to Albany to try the fur business. This venture ended in failure because the War of 1812 had ruined the businesses that tried to sell over seas. Alan began to overwork and exhaust himself, he died in 1832, leaving his wife and children dependant on richer family members.

When Melville's dad died, his life became unstable. Herman was forced to leave Albany Academy and find a job. He had to train himself, and find odd jobs. Herman Melville continued doing various jobs for the rest of his life because he was always restless and in search of an adventure. He was a bank clerk, he worked on family farms and at his older brothers business. He traveled all over the world serving on different positions of various ships. He was a clerk in Honolulu, he even lived among a cannibal tribe called the Typee Indians. Herman Melville went west to find his fortune, when that didn't work out, he moved back to New York and grew restless. This made him decide to live his life as a seamen.

It was all these adventures that led to his great stories. He came back from his travels and told his family about them, they told him to write them down, This started his literary career. Thanks to Herman Melville's adventurous life, we have a lot of books to read which take us to different areas of the world we could never visit any other way.

**********************************************************************************
This was written to fulfill my grammar assignment. I used the following websites as my sources:
http://people.brandeis.edu/~teuber/melvillebio.html
http://www.online-literature.com/melville/