The Futures of Billy Budd

Abstract: In 2024, Billy Budd, Sailor turned a hundred years old. Published posthumously in 1924, at the height of the Melville revival, it soon entered the Melvillean canon and gave rise to some of the most influential pieces of Melville scholarship, by critics such as Barbara Johnson or Eve K. Sedgwick, among many others. Following this rich tradition, the present contribution examines the futures of Billy Budd through the lens of political theory, affect theory, food studies, and animal studies.