
Pierre, Herman Melville’s follow up to Moby-Dick, was, without a doubt, the most challenging, perplexing, befuddling book I read in school. I still don’t get it.
Still, I love Melville, and I love Maurice Sendak, so when I saw this unused copy of the Kraken addition for half-cover price at my favorite local used bookshop, I couldn’t resist.
Sendak’s bawdy illustrations recall William Blake to me—great stuff—although I’ll probably read Moby-Dick or The Confidence Man again before I make time for Pierre.
Read more about this edition of Pierre here.






I love this book. I bought two copies when it first came out so I could read one with impunity and still have another that was in perfect condition. It’s a surreal read, really, and made more so by the odd editing of this edition by Parker. So to really get the experience, you have to read this version, then whenever you see the three asterisks in the text, you have to grab some OTHER edition of Pierre to see what Parker left out, which then creates a ton of questions, which somehow made reading the book even more fun.
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