The Errant Art of Moby-DickIn The Errant Art of Moby Dick, one of Americas most distinguished critics reexamines Melvilles monumental novel and turns the occasion into a meditation on the history and implications of canon formation. In Moby Dicka work virtually ignored and discredited at the time of its publicationWilliam V. Spanos uncovers a text remarkably suited as a foundation for a "New Americanist" critique of the ideology based on Puritan origins that was codified in the