HE MARGINALIA of great writers have always been highly valued not only because they are rare but because they often clarify what eludes us in manuscripts, letters, or biographical recollections. This is particularly true with Melville because so little from him is left to us beyond his published work.

A valuable part of what we do have is his books, most of them either at Harvard University or in the New York Public Library. The bulk of the collection consists of titles which he acquired after 1850 when he began a long and determined program of reading that was to last until the end of his life. He marked passages in his books as he read them. When he came to statements he found particularly striking or ones with which he disagreed he did not hesitate to set down his own feelings in the margins. These markings and annotations are the record of an intimate dialogue between himself and the great writers. And because these marginalia were for his own use, they provide an unusually clear and direct view of his thinking. What one prepares for others to read is usually quite different from the notes one makes for oneself. The marginalia are easy to follow. Passages are usually checked or underlined. Double or triple checks and multiple underlinings obviously denote stronger emphasis. Problems, however, begin to arise with the annotations. Melville's hand is not always easy to read. Most frustrating are the instances where annotations have been erased, or in the Bible,