Wenke's work on Melville included in collection

SALISBURY, MD ---Dr. John Wenke, Salisbury University professor of English, was one of four scholars on Herman Melville to have works included in New Essays on Billy Budd, a collection published by Cambridge University Press and edited by Donald Yannella. In "Melville's Indirection: Billy Budd, the Genetic Text, and 'the Deadly Space Between,'" Wenke examines the workings of Melville's mind as seen through changes in successive drafts of this unfinished manuscript.

Wenke's works on Melville also include the book Melville's Muse: Literary Creation and the Forms of Philosophical Fiction and numerous shorter pieces. Also a noted scholar on American fiction author J. D. Salinger, Wenke was recently featured on To the Best of Our Knowledge, an exploration of the life and legacy of Salinger. This National Public Radio broadcast also included interviews with Garrison Keillor and Margaret Salinger.