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[Unregistered]

If you did not read chapters like The Whiteness of the Whale and The Sperm Whale's Head - A Contrasted View you have missed some of the novels great symbolic tones. I would suggest that you go back and read them it may give you a whole new outlook on the book.

[Anon]

I have thoroughly analyzed this book for the third time and I still find new things to enjoy...truly a quality of a legendary novel.

[Mike]

I can't believe anyone would skip the Whiteness of the Whale. That is one of the most important chapters in the book. It tells why Melville wrote the book. It opens with Ishmael saying he told us why Ahab hunted Moby. He needs to say why he did. He paints white in terms of awe and terror that make this chapter a great prose poem. He looks at racial attitudes, human cynicism, faith, nature, and death. He makes white a hue to be feared--the color of skeletons and ice, a color to be awed at, it is the blending of all colors. White becomes "the white shroud that wraps all.... And of all these things the Albino whale was the symbol. Wonder ye then at the fiery hunt?" <br> I have heard many people talk about all those chapters that can be left out, but they miss some of the best reading by skipping them. Each says something impratant, often funny, often bitter. Camille Paglia claims the chapter on the squid is about vaginas. One chapter seems about how the spermaceti is reduced to oil, but is either homo-erotic or about brotherhood. Melville hides many wonderful surprises in them.

[S.Kristine Kahl]

What is wrong this novel? I say nothing. I love it, I had to read it for my junior AP English class too, and I loved it. Oh, Starbuck, I'm just about in love. I grieve with this book. The poetic writing strikes me. Forget Ahab so much and think on Starbuck and Ishmael and poor Queequeg. Yet Ahab is a good character too! The story of the Blacksmith intrigues and poor little Pip, funny Stubb makeing the cook preach to sharks and the laughible Frenchmen with whom Stubb speaks. I admit, I skip "The Whitness of the Whale" and a few like chapters, but that does not take away from the novel. Simple-minded people, gits I say, think this is not a great novel. Damn be all who thinks otherwise. I say lament to Starbuck, Queequeg, and Pip. And oh, see Ahab down to his doom. Faithful nobel Starbuck, let not the coffee houses blacken your name, for I like mine with cream and sugar.