White Jacket
- First published
- 1850
- Reading level
- Plain English
- Price
- Free
About the book
"White-Jacket; Or, The World on a Man-of-War" by Herman Melville is a novel published in 1850. Drawing from Melville's service aboard a U.S. Navy frigate, this work delivers a fierce critique of American naval life. The story follows a sailor whose homemade white jacket becomes both his identity and his curse, leading to near-fatal encounters at sea. Melville's graphic descriptions of flogging helped abolish the practice in the Navy, making this his most politically charged work and a precursor to "Moby-Dick."
- Sea stories
- Sailors
- Naval discipline
- Flagellation
- Warships
- United States
Updated September 2026. Public domain in the USA. Text and summary from Project Gutenberg eBook #10712. White Jacket on Wikipedia.
