CONFIDENCE-MAN, THE

Melville's allegorical satire of antebellum American Life, The Confidence-Man is a challenging metaphysical and ethical exploration of American society. "In The Confidence-Man," writes John Bryant in his Introduction, "Melville found a way to render our tragic sense of self and society through the comic strategies of the confidence game. He puts the reader in the game to play its parts and to contemplate the inconsistencies of its knaves and fools.