Short Stories - The Fiddler by Herman Melville

An American writer and poet and considered as one of America’s greatest authors from the American Renaissance period. Though his great fame came much after his death he remains an ever present on the list of classic authors among such greats as Jack London, Emily Dickinson, Tennessee Williams, and Nathaniel Hawthorne to name just a few.He was born to staunchly Christian parents and both his grandfathers were heroes of the American Revolutionary War, a point of pride in the family.They were not affluent, and his father was unsuccessful in making the money of his own family and that of his wife’s family go far in his business undertakings. For this reason the family moved to smaller lodgings and when even “the tiny tuition fee seemed too much to pay” Melville stopped attending the Albany Academy. He worked as a clerk, a schoolteacher and then at se ...