Race and Violence in Billy Budd, Sailor : Melville's Radical Humanity

Abstract: In this piece I reflect on my earlier work on Billy Budd and revolutionary violence and suggest that Melville's treatment of violence, specifically racialized violence, constitutes an as-yet understudied aspect of his work. This "radical humanity" calls into question implicit definitions of revolutionary subjectivity and what constitutes "legitimate" revolutionary violence. In considering how we might look at unlikely actors like Billy as legitimate revolutionary subjects, I argue that Melville continuously asks his readers to question who "gets" to react violently when their freedom is threatened. Looking towards future studies I also suggests that Melville's definition of revolutionary subjectivity might also extend to non-violent and non-heroic characters like Pip in Moby-Dick .