Editing Omoo (section)

== Writing style ==
Compared to ''Typee'', in ''Omoo'' a new style was emerging,<ref>Delbanco (2005), p. 117</ref> of a "distinct and original signature," as critic Warner Berthoff describes it.<ref>Quoted in Delbanco (2005), p. 117</ref> Biographer Hershel Parker finds the narrator "powerfully attractive," because through the comical nature of the events "a new sensibility was emerging."<ref>Parker (1996), p. 454</ref>  Melville's "new command of language," as Parker calls this development, came with hints of what would be characteristic of his mature style in ''Moby-Dick'' and later books.<ref>Parker (1996), p. 454.</ref> These include the merging of images from various historical times and places. Essentially, an example of this can be found in chapter 27 of ''Omoo'', where the narrator sees on a ship in the harbor of Tahiti the name of a town along the Hudson river: "In an instant, palm-trees and elms--canoes and skiffs--church spires and bamboos--all mingled in one vision of the present and the past."<ref>Quoted in Parker (1996), p. 454.</ref>

Another emerging characteristic was the influence of [[Bible|Scripture]] on Melville's writing. A few examples suffice to illustrate this point: in chapter 2, the mate "abhorred all weak infusions, and cleaved manfully to strong drink" echoes [[Epistle to the Romans|Romans]] 12:9; "Woe be unto" him in chapter 14 repeats a biblical expression found in several places, for instance in [[Jeremiah]] 23:1; the character Kooloo in chapter 40 is "as sounding brass and a tinkling cynbal," which Melville took from [[First Epistle to the Corinthians|1 Corinthians]] 13:1.<ref>Parker (1996), p. 454-455</ref>