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. The Piazza Tales, published in 1856, is a collection of the following six short stories: The Piazza, Bartleby, Benito Cereno, The Lightning-Rod Man, The Encantadas, and The Bell-Tower.