CURIOUS FACTS

- Much of Melville’s later work – the majority of which is now his most highly regarded fiction was neither critically nor commercially successful when it was first published. Between 1863 and 1887, an average of 23 copies of Moby-Dick – now his most widely read book were sold each year. It now sells more copies each year than were sold in the entire nineteenth century and is acknowledged as a classic.
-Another giant of nineteenth-century American fiction, Nathaniel Hawthorne – perhaps best known for his novel about adultery, The Scarlet Letter – lived next door to Melville for a time. Melville dedicated Moby-Dick to Hawthorne.