Props for Project Gutenberg. Thanks, Paul.

I would prefer not to read "Bartleby" again...

Remember how in school you would read something that some ancient guy said way in the past in the 1800s and you'd think about how stupid everyone must have been to believe it. Well, we say that stuff all the time now!

@2 you beat me to it.

I'm with #2 and #5. Paul Constant is a huge failure in this recommendation of Melville. But if he's like me, when it comes to failure on the web, it's actually preferable. So all of you convincing winners, "I would prefer not to."

I kinda like "I and My Chimney". Obsessive but not whalesized.

@2, 5 and probably hundreds of other similarly hilarious and quick witted folk,

You beat me to it.

Is it OK to see a movie based on a Melville book instead? I haven't seen "Billy Budd", which looks dire, but I can recommend "Moby DIck", with its script by Ray Bradbury, or "Bartleby" with Crispin Glover, which is like an offbrand "Office Space".

@7 "Paul Constant is a huge failure in this recommendation of Melville. But if he's like me, when it comes to failure on the web, it's actually preferable."

As an undergrad in the 1970's, I had a professor who was ABD. His dissertatin was supposed to be on the theme of failure in Melville. The fact that he never finished was ironically appropriate.