Critics who say how easily you could have done something else--something better

Final installment of Scenes Beyond the Western Border
Southern Literary Messenger 19 (August 1853)

As illustrated in previous Dragooned posts on

• mazes and fancies and fly off
• seraphs fanning air and  
• thou wert and 
• the pursuit of happiness and
• feels like a woman and
• you call that abstraction the real?

the dialogues in Scenes Beyond the Western Border 1851-3 abound in verbal parallels to Mardi (1849), aptly described by John Wenke as "Melville's first book of talk."

Here's another example of parallel phrasing, this time from the first volume of Mardi. The similar constructions ("so/how easily you could have....") occur in very similar dramatic settings, dialogues that record ongoing criticism of literary performance by one of the speakers. In the example from Mardi, Mohi the historian first criticizes Yoomy's poem THE SONG as boring (maybe), then Babbalanja the philosopher criticizes Yoomy's sensitivity to negative criticism:

Yoomy,” said old Mohi with a yawn, “you composed that song, then, did you?” 

“I did,” said Yoomy, placing his turban a little to one side. 

“Then, minstrel, you shall sing me to sleep every night, especially with that song of Marlena; it is soporific as the airs of Nora-Bamma.” 

“Mean you, old man, that my lines, setting forth the luxurious repose to be enjoyed hereafter, are composed with such skill, that the description begets the reality; or would you ironically suggest, that the song is a sleepy thing itself?” 

“An important discrimination,” said Media; “which mean you, Mohi ?” 

“Now, are you not a silly boy,” said Babbalanja, “when from the ambiguity of his speech, you could so easily have derived something flattering, thus to seek to extract unpleasantness from it? Be wise, Yoomy; and hereafter, whenever a remark like that seems equivocal, be sure to wrest commendation from it, though you torture it to the quick.” 

“And most sure am I, that I would ever do so; but often I so incline to a distrust of my powers, that I am far more keenly alive to censure, than to praise; and always deem it the more sincere of the two; and no praise so much elates me, as censure depresses.” --Mardi; And a Voyage Thither vol. 2 chapter 103

In the closing chapter as elsewhere in "Scenes Beyond the Western Border," the narrator's prairie friend Frank critiques the narrative so far. Too metaphysical, too abstract. As in Mardi, the criticized writer gets space to explain himself and his motives.

I read to him my day’s experiences. He listened impatiently; and at last broke out—
“You are incorrigible! Do you call that abstraction, the real?”  

C.—Surely it has a mournfully same, and daily reality!”  

F.—“And how easily by a mere turn of expression, you could have given it the interest of a simple narrative!”

C.—“Well, I’m too indolent; for, if I commenced, I might imagine myself bound to keep it up; and I scribble by no rule, and with no object but pastime; and, to compare in some future day the old with the new tone of mind."

--August 1853 Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures Part II