Reading Guide on Melville’s “Benito Cereno”

The Cast of Characters

Amasa Delano

Benito Cereno

Babo

Atuful

Aranda

The “oakum pickers”

The Ashantee hatchet polishers

The negresses

San Dominick [an allegorical name suggesting an idea]

The Bachelor’s Delight

Rover [an allegorical name suggesting an idea]

Red marks new vocabulary

What area of the world are the two ships in?

What was the approaching ship missing which among most captains would have arouse suspicion?

Delano might have been inclined to suspect the approaching ship and been alarmed had it not been for what?

The San Dominick looked like a warship except for . . . . what was missing?

What did the light on the hull look to be to Delano?

What freight did Delano imagine through the mist that the ship might be carrying?

What freight did it actually turn out to be?

What did Delano send over to the stranger?

It looked like a warship except for . . . . what was missing?

The central figure in the stern-piece was . . . . ?

When first coming aboard ship, Delano thought which group was loudest and most desperate sounding?

Two groups of elderly blacks were constantly working:  What were they doing?

When Delano first sees Babo, he has an impression:  What does Babo remind Delano of?

What had Delano brought to the San Dominick?

What’s the first act of filial care Delano sees Babo perform?

In Delano’s estimation what are Negroes best suited for?

What did Delano take Don Benito’s surliness and indifference to him to mean, possibly?  Actually he speculates on this throughout the story.

Who did Don Benito not show “splenetic disrelish” toward?

How did the crew receive their orders from Don Benito?

According to Delano’s thinking, Don Benito might have thought captains were like gods in what way?  Why is this a joke?

What did the “oakum pickers” informally act as?

What was chiefly lacking in Delano’s eyes/opinion?

What did Delano ask Don Benito to give the particulars of?  How did Don Benito respond to this request?  So Delano did what in response to Don Benito’s reaction?  At which point Don Benito changes his behavior how?

How did Babo act when Delano ask Don Benito about the history of the San Dominick?

As Don Benito tells their story, he accidentally contradicts himself.  Can you find the contradiction?

How did Babo explain Don Benito’s collapse at this point?

Who does Don Benito credit with their survival?

Don Benito use this story to explain the lack of what?

What can not Delano call Babo and why not?  What specifically was Babo able to do?

The narrator describes Delano’s thinking as ______?______-thinking.  Stop and think about the possible several meanings of the word at this point.  This is a pun.

At first Don Benito was elated at the prospect of getting help from Delano.  But that changed.  Why?

What 2 symbols link Atuful and Don Benito together?  Or maybe its one symbol taken together?

While Babo and Cereno were whispering, what did the sailor in the rigging do that caught Delano’s attention?

After the whispering session, Don Benito asks Delano a series of questions.  What is the subject of these questions?  Notice the position of Babo and Don Benito and the direction of their gaze as Don Benito converses with Delano.  What do you make of that image/tableaux?

What did Delano see under the sailor’s shirt as he came down from the sail?

Delano dwells on a number of possible suspicions.  Name three of them.

As the whaleboat approaches a second conflict develps on deck which Delano questions.  What happens on deck?  Do you remember the 1^st incident among the knife polishers similar to this?

Babo dispels any doubts Delano may have about his trustworthiness by doing what?

Click here to find Reading Guide for the end of Benito Cereno