《水手比利·巴德》的发表，在20世纪20年代帮助梅尔维尔建立了“美国最伟大的作家之一”的名望。这部小说是一个关于善与恶、人判与神判、个人与国家、激情与职责、法律条文与法律精神、单纯与阅历、内心与外貌、陆地与海洋的经典小说。

Billy Budd, Sailor is a novella by American writer Herman Melville, first published posthumously in London in 1924. Melville began writing the work in November 1888, but left it unfinished at his death in 1891. It was acclaimed by British critics as a masterpiece when published in London, and quickly took its place among the canon of significant works in the United States.

Herman Melville(August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, writer of short stories, and poet from the American Renaissance period. The bulk of his writings was published between 1846 and 1857. Best known for his sea adventure Typee (1846) and his whaling novel Moby-Dick (1852), he was almost forgotten during the last thirty years of his life.