Herman Melville was one of the greatest American writers of the Renaissance period in the 19th century. Melville was a very influential writer in many genres of fiction, including sea stories, Allegory, and Gothic Romanticism. Melville's classic novel Moby-Dick remains one of the most widely read books in American literature with most students reading it by the time they graduate high school. Battle-Pieces and Aspects of War is a book of poetry that centers around the American Civil War and its aftermath. The book, which was published in 1866 just one year after the end of the war, set forth Melville's thoughts on how the post-war Reconstruction should be carried out.