MELVILLE, Herman (1819-1891). Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life. New York, 1846.
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MELVILLE, Herman (1819-1891). Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life. New York, 1846.

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MELVILLE, Herman (1819-1891). Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life. New York, 1846.
2 parts in one, 12o. Frontispiece map. (Some minor spotting.) Publisher's blind-stamped brownish plum cloth (some rubbing and fading with minor wear to extremities); quarter morocco slipcase.

FIRST AMERICAN EDITION of Melville's first book. The adventure story is based on Melville's jumping ship from a whaler in the early 1840s, his captivity in the Marquesas, and his escape on an Australian ship. Later in 1846 a revised edition was published omitting the appendix, adding a chapter on the fate of Melville's shipmate Toby, and presenting a "text which was considerably altered and censored" (Minnigerode). For example, the revised edition omitted the following passage in the account of the sailors meeting the native women: "Not the feeblest barrier was interposed between the unholy passions of the crew and their unlimited gratification" (p. 13). BAL 13653 (variant A).

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