Budd Vs Claggart

The narrator’s language as pertinent to Billy Budd and Claggart’s dynamic demonstrates an ambiguous perspective of binary opposition. Billy Budd and Claggart are conversely good and evil. Billy Budd is a handsome sailor whose intentions only seems good. Claggart is a pallid faced sailor who intends to bring down Billy. “But Claggart’s conscience being but the lawyer to his will, made ogres of trifles, probably arguing that the motive imputed to Billy in spilling the soup just when he did, together with the epithets alleged, these, if nothing more, made a strong case against him” (Melville 13). Claggart’s “conscience being but the lawyer to his will” means that the Master-at-arms often used his inner feelings to deal with issues. Unlike Billy,

Billy Budds’ death displayed Billy as both a martyr and a victim. Billy Budd was a martyr because of his good relationships with his fellow shipmates. The foretopman was a victim because of Captain Vere’s punishment to his crime. “Go now,” said Captain Vere with something of his wonted manner —“Go now. I shall presently call a drum-head court. Tell the lieutenants what has happened, and tell Mr. Mordant,” meaning the Captain of Marines, “and charge them to keep the matter to themselves” (Melville 19). However, Captain Vere, void of any emotion, takes action by, “call a drum-head court”. Vere, although he knows Billy was not behind a mutiny, calls up a drum-head court to put Billy on trial. Captain Vere thought of Billy as his own son. However, he held the law higher than he held his emotions for Billy. Billy Budd was both martyred and victimized by Captain Vere. “Was Abel a victim or a martyr, a bloody corpse or an offering, a man who died or a man who went to God?” (Kelly 39). Billy Budd was a victim and martyr; however, he was not an offering. Billy was a martyr because he believed in Vere, even after the captain put him on trial. The foretopman was a victim because of Vere’s willingness to follow the law, instead of what he thought was correct. With no true witnesses around the night of Claggart’s death, it was difficult for Billy’s story to get around, factually that is. “John Claggart, the ship’s Master-at-arms, discovering that some sort of plot was incipient among an inferior section of the ship’s company, and that the ringleader was one William Budd” (Melville 19). John Claggart, the antagonist of the story told to use, was being portrayed as the hero, “discovering that some sort of plot was incipient”, the night he died. Billy was reversely portrayed as, “ringleader”, the villain of the story. The account of a different potroyal of the story pokes