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영어

Melville’s historical novel, Israel Potter sets out to depict the sacrifice of the common patriot that had been forgotten as a consequence that followed from the ideology of commemoration culture. During the 19th century, American society confronted the emergence and spread of market capitalism, as a result of which materialism and practicality, symbolized by the philosophy of Franklin, dominated that society. In the attempts to escape from this mental barrenness, two developments occurred, namely the ascent of fervent patriotism and of transcendentalism. However, Melville critiques these as exploiting the victimization of the common people, while at the same time ironically strengthening the dominant ideologies of materialism and nationalism. If we focus on the life of Israel Potter taking the implied author’s viewpoint, the false consciousness of the dominant class, with its monumentalist view of their history, is inevitably revealed. They forget too easily the sacrifice made by the common people to buttress their revolutionary heroism. Melville, for his part, in order to deconstruct this false consciousness, tries to show the reality of 19th century American society through the metaphor of a pyramid-like monument.