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Journal of a Visit to the Levant

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Betty and Chad B.
Journal of a Visit to the Levant

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Herman Melville made a trip to Europe and the Levant (1856-57) when he was just thirty-seven. He was not a typical pilgrim, but an intense and troubled traveler--a man on a quest. As he wrote in his journal: "The mind cannot but be sadly and suggestively affected with the indifference of Nature and Man to all that makes the spot sacred to the Christian. Weeds grow upon Mount Zion; side by side in impartiality appear the shadows of church & mosque."

In the nineteenth century, American men of letters were ardent keepers of diaries, journals, and notebooks. Although Melville's journals are comparatively brief, they are invaluable illuminations of his mind at work.

His eighteen-day sojourn in the Holy Land, in and around Jerusalem, had a profound effect on his understanding of faith in the landscape where Judeo-Christianity had emerged. The journal entries of his impressions and experiences during his brief stay would lead to his most ambitious work, the epic poem Clarel, published twenty years after his visit.

Note: This meetup will be recorded for private use.

For this meetup, we will read pages 76-161 ("December 11, 1856" to "January 27, 1857")

Journal of a Visit to Europe and the Levant:

Supplemental:

This meetup is part of a series on The Crescent and the Cross.

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