Moby! [Archive] - Literature Network Forums

bounty

11-25-2023, 04:07 PM

its probably a good thing ive already read it. had I been reading along for the first time I likely would have done very little but complain. but now, a few years removed from the major disappointment, maybe i'll be able to help someone else enjoy it.

i probably have a cliffnotes version i wouldn't mind peeking at.

my aforementioned history book page falls under the 4th part of the book called "the emergence of religious pluralism" under the chapter "legacies of a 'Christian america'" under the section called "a literature preoccupied with god" and finally under a subsection called "Christianity in the literary canon."

Melville was a friend of hawthorne, who had puritan ancestry, and his life overlapped chronologically with Emily Dickinson (don't know if they knew each other) who is also mentioned in the chapter. i bring her up because she also lived in Massachusetts, though apparently highly cloistered.

tuck this away for later: remind me when you guys get to chapter 128.

meanwhile Sancho, you might enjoy this; not to steal moby's thunder, i recently got turned onto a website called tvtropes.org and have been enjoying looking around. i discovered a thing called "the dulcinea effect."

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheDulcineaEffect

(there are ten pages of moby dick references at the site)

Sancho

11-25-2023, 08:48 PM

Sounds good. I’ll let you know when I get to Chapter 128. Here’s where I am so far:

“Call me Ishmael.”

And okay I already have some questions. Am I supposed to call him Ishmael because it’s his name, or because he’s writing under an alias for some reason or another?

It’s gotta be one of the most familiar first sentences of any novel, ever. But I’ll be honest, I remembered it wrong. Or rather I remembered the second sentence wrong. I thought it was:

“Call me Ishmael. Ishmael is my name.”

I think I thought that because of this Steve Goodman tune:

https://youtu.be/pXX3GvwxhSk?si=Idi8nXG5ruEm7ql1

I even tried to learn that song on my guitar some years ago — never mind how long precisely. (Bet Y’all didn’t know this thread comes with a soundtrack.)

Here’s the rest of Melville’s opening:

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago — never mind how long precisely — having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world.

And that’s a pretty good start for an adventure story, eh?

Side note: I am well familiar with the Dulcinea effect. I mean what red-blooded man hasn’t fantasized about saving a damsel in distress at one time or another?

Danik 2016

11-25-2023, 10:57 PM

I'm enjoying all your comments on this opportune thread. Like bounty I won't reread this book, which I probably read more than fifty years ago on account of it being a regular door stopper. But if you allow I will occasionally chime in. I also like the idea
of looking at the biblical and other references.

As for the one sentence from the novel I can remember, the one just mentioned by Sancho in the post above : "Call me Ishmael", it is an interesting opening. It suggests to me that Ishmael may or may not be the name of the narrator. I get the idea of a narrator that is not to open about himself. Ishmael has some biblical meaning but I don't remember which. In Nazi German , I remember, Jewish men had to call themselves Ismael and the women Sara.

hellsapoppin

11-26-2023, 12:13 AM

Sounds good. I’ll let you know when I get to Chapter 128. Here’s where I am so far:

“Call me Ishmael.”

And okay I already have some questions. Am I supposed to call him Ishmael because it’s his name, or because he’s writing under an alias for some reason or another?

It’s gotta be one of the most familiar first sentences of any novel, ever. But I’ll be honest, I remembered it wrong. Or rather I remembered the second sentence wrong. I thought it was:

“Call me Ishmael. Ishmael is my name.”

I think I thought that because of this Steve Goodman tune:

https://youtu.be/pXX3GvwxhSk?si=Idi8nXG5ruEm7ql1

I even tried to learn that song on my guitar some years ago — never mind how long precisely. (Bet Y’all didn’t know this thread comes with a soundtrack.)

Here’s the rest of Melville’s opening:

And that’s a pretty good start for an adventure story, eh?

Side note: I am well familiar with the Dulcinea effect. I mean what red-blooded man hasn’t fantasized about saving a damsel in distress at one time or another?

"Ishmael" roughly means 'God will hear'. The biblical Ishmael was an outcast having no particular family except for mankind. He is regarded historically as a messenger and prophet by many (esp by Muslims). Thus, the name implies that he is a messenger for you and for all of humanity.

On another thread I wrote about what that message is. You may find it here:

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?105709-Which-is-the-greatest-Great-American-novel-and-why&p=1401819&viewfull=1#post1401819

Before anyone reads Moby Dick they should read Robert K Wallace's book so that they can see that Melville was conveying the same messages made by Frederick Douglass in his sermons on racial/ethnic equality before God and man.

tailor STATELY

11-26-2023, 04:09 AM

Interesting in how there is an antebellum wikipedia of whale sources in "Etymology" and
"Extracts" (especially) which the author offers the reader to fire the imagination before the famous opening lines: "Call me Ishmael." in CHAPTER I.—Loomings

Added: Perusing Google Scholar I found an excerpt from a book that gives some background information for Melville/Moby Dick titled "Call Me Ishmael" no less by Charles Olson... https://www.google.com/books/edition/Call_Me_Ishmael/AVykDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1

Olson's book alludes to Shakespeare/King Lear which is fortuitous in that I recently watched the play on youtube from a link Danik 2016 supplied that may aid in my study. Whether style or substance I do not know yet. Other allusions: Moses/Law of blood, and Christ.

Thanks hellsapoppin re: Robert K Wallace and the note about Frederick Douglas, although the toothpaste is already out of the tube.

Evidentially the book is more than a whale's tale as was my assessment on my first reading anciently.

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor

bounty

11-26-2023, 08:04 AM

poppin, if you've read Wallace's book, then id encourage you to wed whats in it to the specific parts of the posts here when the opportunity arises.

as a case in that point---and to put the biblical Ishmael in better context. he was born due to a lack of trust in god from Abraham and sarah, who had "given" Abraham her maidservant hagar so that they could have the child that god promised them. Ishmael's birth happens outside the covenant of god. he was sent away, not to much because of that, but because of his mocking of sarah. gen 21:9-10.

its not accurate to say that he had no "family except for mankind." even though "ishmaelites" were known as nomads, he had a wife, and genesis 25:12-18 accounts for a large number of descendants.

Ishmael is not a revered figure in Christendom (nor apparently in Judaism) and very broadly speaking, in so much as he can be traced to present day arab nations and islam, the current state of affairs can be linked to the quote that ends the section above, "and they lived in hostility towards all their brothers."

so back to the book, given the above, its not clear on the surface why Melville would have the narrator of the story be named "Ishmael."

i think any leaps from god through douglass to Melville as explained by Wallace and in using "Ishmael" would have be nailed down lots more clearly to think its because he is regarded as a messenger and his name means "god will hear."

Sancho--the tvtropes folks make the dulcinea effect a subset of the damsel in distress one. the former being somewhat derogatorily applied to women the heroes met only five minutes ago.

for another thought on the opening of the book, see the attachment.

Danik 2016

11-26-2023, 11:02 AM

"bounty-Ishmael is not a revered figure in Christendom (nor apparently in Judaism) and very broadly speaking, in so much as he can be traced to present day arab nations and islam, the current state of affairs can be linked to the quote that ends the section above, "and they lived in hostility towards all their brothers."

so back to the book, given the above, its not clear on the surface why Melville would have the narrator of the story be named "Ishmael."

Thinking about it, without knowing both recommended book, Ishmael appears as an outsider, a sort of rootless, jobless tramp, the right man to be recruited for a whale hunt like this one.

If anyone wants to read the book, i found this link with several download options.
I don´t know if the Litnet library is still active. If it is it should be available there too.

bounty

11-26-2023, 11:17 AM

that's an interesting way to look at it danik.

I don't remember enough of the book to comment on that, but maybe its something Sancho and tailor can keep their eyes peeled for as we all go along.

Sancho

11-26-2023, 11:56 AM

Welcome aboard Danik!
Welcome aboard hellsapoppin!

Evidentially the book is more than a whale's tale as was my assessment on my first reading anciently.

Well said, Tailor. Looks like we’ve already got a couple of ideas on the book’s subtext laid out here — one ancient (the Old Testament names), and one current (attitudes towards race).

Danik, that is an interesting tidbit about the Nazis. I’d assume it was part of the dehumanization process the Nazis used against the Jews. The choice of Sarah seems obvious, but why Ishmael? Sarah of course was Abraham’s wife, mother of Isaac, stepmother of Ishmael, and the ancestral mother of all of Judaea. Sarah is also a hugely popular name, probably more so for Jewish girls than Christian girls. (I think Mary wins the day for the Christians) Was Ishmael a popular name for Jewish boys in mid twentieth century Germany? I don’t know. I’ve got a pretty superficial knowledge of the Hebrew Bible — Ishmael got booted out of Abraham’s tribe and went on head up the Arab side of the house. His mother was Egyptian. He figures more prominently in The Koran than The Torah or The Bible.

Anyway, I’m still at the adventure level of the story. The Ishmael of Moby Dick is almost immediately a likable fellow. He’s also got a serious case of cabin fever, and a case of the winter blues. In his words — A damp, drizzly, November of the soul. He decides he needs to get to sea to:

to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off

Haha! Been there. I’ve got a job that puts me on the road a lot. If I’m stuck at the house for more than a few days, I get antsy to be out on a trip. Not only that, my wife gets antsy for me to be out on the road as well — “When’s your next trip, hon? Don’t you have somewhere else you need to be?”

Anyway, here’s the soundtrack for cabin fever. Land Ho! by The Doors:

https://youtu.be/yBWCgwKersU?si=0dIW_0CZMWVt6R5h

BTW my Grandpa was a sailor. Also, Robbie’s guitar is pretty awesome in that tune.

Danik 2016

11-26-2023, 12:00 PM

Thanks, bounty! Just had a look at the first chapters, the book has many funny passages. Loved the language.

If anyone wants it , I found this link with several options of download:
https://onemorelibrary.com/index.php/en/books/literature/book/north-american-literature-176/moby-dick-3161

hellsapoppin

11-26-2023, 12:02 PM

quoting bounty: "poppin, if you've read Wallace's book, then id encourage you to wed whats in it to the specific parts of the posts here when the opportunity arises"

Sorry. I no longer have the book and cannot quote from it. But it is a good source for info on the linkage between the two writers.

bounty

11-26-2023, 12:56 PM

Sancho---danik made a typo, or a literary influenced changed memory, about Nazi germany:

The Executive Order on the Law on the Alteration of Family and Personal Names requires German Jews bearing first names of “non-Jewish” origin to adopt an additional name: “Israel” for men and “Sara” for women.The government required Jews to identify themselves in ways that would permanently separate them from the rest of the German population.

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/timeline-event/holocaust/1933-1938/law-on-alteration-of-family-and-personal-names

bounty

11-26-2023, 01:33 PM

poppin, interesting, there is actually another book of the same nature:

https://www.amazon.com/Frederick-Douglass-Herman-Melville-Relation/dp/0807858722

you can access the Wallace book here if you join:

https://archive.org/details/douglassmelville0000wall/page/n7/mode/2up

large sections of it are here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=0XhPufy9nQMC&pg=PA12&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false

hellsapoppin

11-26-2023, 07:32 PM

quoting bounty:

its not accurate to say that he had no "family except for mankind." even though "ishmaelites" were known as nomads, he had a wife, and genesis 25:12-18 accounts for a large number of descendants.

My error - meant to say that about Ishmael from MB, not the biblical one. Sorry for not being clear about that. Indeed, the biblical Ish had a large family and Arabs are his descendants. Not so for our storybook hero. No family but he does speak for humanity.

hellsapoppin

11-26-2023, 07:34 PM

Danik 2016

11-26-2023, 08:19 PM

Sancho---danik made a typo, or a literary influenced changed memory, about Nazi germany:

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/timeline-event/holocaust/1933-1938/law-on-alteration-of-family-and-personal-names

You are right, bounty. It's Israel and not Ismael. Thanks for the correction.

hellsapoppin

11-26-2023, 11:08 PM

What is ''Matelotage''

Why do sailors call each other "mate"?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matelotage

Matelotage (French for "seamanship") was an agreement amongst pairs of European sailors, in particular buccaneers, in the 17th and early 18th century. As part of this economic partnership, "matelots" would agree to share their incomes, and inherit their partner's property in the case of their death. In addition, they would pledge to protect and fight alongside each other in battle and otherwise act in the other's interest.[1] Not limited to sailors or pirates

I have a background in law and have read of court cases which dealt with the subject. In virtually every case, the contractual agreement made subject to Matelotage was upheld.

Do we see such a possible arrangement in MB? I suggest we do in Chapter 10 ~ A Bosom Friend

After Ish leaves church and Quee prayed to his pagan icon, the two settled and enjoyed a smoke. Then Quee gave half of his money to Ish, pressed his forehead together with Ish, said they were now "married", then the ''bedfellows'' went off to the bed they shared, and slept in peace as a "cosy loving pair."

Thoughts?

Sancho

11-27-2023, 11:52 AM

There’s a lot going on there.
Ismael proves himself open minded for the day by taking as a bestie a dark, heavily tattooed, unapologetic cannibal.
In everything Queequeq does he proves himself to be a standup guy and a loyal friend.
Melville, I think, is having a little fun with, and testing his reader’s prejudices by making Queequeq the most moral character in the book.

The relationship between the two certainly looks a lot like the Matelotage described on the wiki link, but it’s more of an informal and natural agreement between Queequeq and Ishmael than the agreement entered into by European sailors. I think Ishmael goes along with it initially because he figures it’s Queequeg’s custom. And Ismael goes along with it right away. He goes from being terrified of Queequeq to being totally trusting of him and willing to sleep in the bed with him very quickly. “Better to sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunk Christian” (something like that) Despite all the homoerotic shading, it appears to be a strictly Platonic relationship.

I loved the scene where they signed onto the Pequod. Ismael negotiates his deal (a ripoff IMO) with Captains Peleg and Bildad, the two owners of the boat. The two old Quakers play a sort of good cop bad cop routine on Ishmael and he walks away less than he should’ve gotten — a three hundredth stake. The back and forth between Peleg and Bildad is hilarious:

Captain Peleg —

“Fiery pit! fiery pit! ye insult me, man; past all natural bearing, ye insult me. It’s an all-fired outrage to tell any human creature that he’s bound to hell. Flukes and flames! Bildad, say that again to me, and start my soulbolts, but I’ll — I’ll — yes, I’ll swallow a live goat with all his hair and horns on. Out of the cabin, ye canting, drab-colored son of a wooden gun — a straight wake with ye!”

More comedy when they sign on Queequeq. They’re a little taken aback by his appearance of course. Bildad is primarily concerned with whether or not Queequeq had converted to Christianity and Peleg wants to know if he’s any good as a harpooner. Queequeq answers Peleg by jumping onto the bow of the whaleboat:

“Cap’ain, you see him small drop tar on water dere? You see him? well, spose him one whale eye, well, den!” and taking sharp aim at it, he darted the iron right over old Bildad’s broad brim, clean across the ship’s decks, and struck the glistening tar spot out of sight.

“Now,” said Queequeg, quietly, hauling in the line, “spos-ee him whale-e eye; why, dad whale dead.”

I can almost picture the stodgy old Bildad checking his hat for harpoon damage. Here’s Peleg after the harpooning demonstration:

“Quick, Bildad,” said Peleg, his partner, who, aghast at the close vicinity of the flying harpoon, had retreated towards the cabin gangway. “Quick, I say, you Bildad, and get the ship’s papers. We must have Hedgehog there, I mean Quohog, in one of our boats. Look ye, Quohog, we’ll give ye the ninetieth lay, and that’s more than ever was given a harpooneer yet out of Nantucket.”

As for Bildad’s reservations concerning Queequeq’s soul, Ishmael insists Queequeq is a deacon in The First Congressional Church. Bildad doesn’t buy it, so Ishmael changes tacks and gives a sort brotherhood of man defense:

“I mean, sir, the same ancient Catholic Church to which you and I, and Captain Peleg there, and Queequeg here, and all of us, and every mother’s son and soul of us belong; the great and everlasting First Congregation of this whole worshipping world; we all belong to that; only some of us cherish some crotchets no ways touching the grand belief; in that we all join hands.”

Well said, Ish’.

So my progress so far in the book is chapter 23 and it looks like a pretty good spot to take a breather. The Pequod has just shoved off on its three-year voyage.

hellsapoppin

11-27-2023, 12:42 PM

~ "The relationship between the two certainly looks a lot like the Matelotage described on the wiki link, but it’s more of an informal and natural agreement between Queequeq and Ishmael than the agreement entered into by European sailors." ~

Actually, most Matelotage contractual agreements made by sailors in those days were informal (that is, not written down) due to the fact that most sailors were illiterate.

~ Despite all the homoerotic shading, it appears to be a strictly Platonic relationship. ~

History shows that most of those agreements were heterosexual. In fact most of the legal cases that arose from the contracts were taken by wives, siblings, or children of one of the partners who sought gold or other belongings left behind after the death of a partner. In just about every case I read of (admittedly, few in number) the contract was upheld and the surviving partner inherited what gold or personalty was left behind.

In the modern era, these cases were used as legal precedent by survivors of same sex partnerships in estate court. Until just a years ago before such marital relationships became legal, surviving litigants had to go to court to legally inherit property (such as real estate, liquid assets, and personalty) from a managing partner. Now with the legalization of such relationships, the point is moot as anyone can now be a beneficiary without any such agreement whether formal or informal.

hellsapoppin

11-27-2023, 12:54 PM

Sancho,

As for Bildad’s reservations concerning Queequeq’s soul, Ishmael insists Queequeq is a deacon in The First Congressional Church. Bildad doesn’t buy it, so Ishmael changes tacks and gives a sort brotherhood of man defense:

“I mean, sir, the same ancient Catholic Church to which you and I, and Captain Peleg there, and Queequeg here, and all of us, and every mother’s son and soul of us belong; the great and everlasting First Congregation of this whole worshipping world; we all belong to that; only some of us cherish some crotchets no ways touching the grand belief; in that we all join hands.”

Ish learned his lesson from Father Mapple whose sermon {Chapter 9} taught the world that we are all "Brethen", "ship mates", brothers and sisters in this troubled world. A timeless lesson, indeed, but one that was shocking to critics in that era, a great many of whom were apologists for slavery and Manifest Destiny which entailed military conquest, the imposition of brutal depredations, and decimation of populations that had settled in the Great Plains and Far West. Readers today do not understand Melville's implications in that regard ~ a point illustrated in the Wallace book.

Sancho

11-27-2023, 02:41 PM

Nice. You know, I didn’t make the connection between Father Mapple’s sermon and Ishmael’s defense of Queequeg. There’s a lot about that sermon I’m still sussing out. I’m sure it will continue to have relevance as book goes on.

Ishmael makes a point of how high the pulpit is and how tight the quarters are in the church, which means there’s not enough room for a staircase to the pulpit/ship’s bow, so Father Mapple climbs a rope ladder. I figure that’s all theater for the sailors. But then he pulls the ladder up behind him. ?? That action has to have some significance I’m not getting…yet.

What do you make of the other church Ishmael stumbles into while he’s looking for a place to stay in New Bedford? (Aside here, The Spouter Inn looks like the Motel 6 of the Ismael’s time) Anyway it’s a negro church. The reverend is preaching about darkness. And Ishmael exits pretty quickly. I sort of pictured the scene this way — Ishmael walks into the church thinking it’s a cheap hotel. All the black faces in the congregation turn look at him — Needle Scratch — Ishmael departs.

Sancho

11-27-2023, 03:19 PM

I may not have made the connection between Ismael’s defense of Queequeg and Father Mapple’s sermon, but Captain Peleg did. In fact he thinks Ismael one-ups Mapple. Here’s his reaction:

“Splice, thou mean’st splice hands,” cried Peleg, drawing nearer. “Young man, you’d better ship for a missionary, instead of a fore-mast hand; I never heard a better sermon. Deacon Deuteronomy — why Father Mapple himself couldn’t beat it, and he’s reckoned something. Come aboard, come aboard: never mind about the papers. I say, tell Quohog there — what’s that you call him? tell Quohog to step along. By the great anchor, what a harpoon he’s got there! looks like good stuff that; and he handles it about right. I say, Quohog, or whatever your name is, did you ever stand in the head of a whale-boat? did you ever strike a fish?”

This of course was just prior to Queequeg’s harpooning demonstration that nearly bisected Captain Bildad’s Quaker hat.

hellsapoppin

11-27-2023, 05:05 PM

Originally Posted by Sancho
Nice. You know, I didn’t make the connection between Father Mapple’s sermon and Ishmael’s defense of Queequeg. There’s a lot about that sermon I’m still sussing out. I’m sure it will continue to have relevance as book goes on.

Ishmael makes a point of how high the pulpit is and how tight the quarters are in the church, which means there’s not enough room for a staircase to the pulpit/ship’s bow, so Father Mapple climbs a rope ladder. I figure that’s all theater for the sailors. But then he pulls the ladder up behind him. ?? That action has to have some significance I’m not getting…yet.

What do you make of the other church Ishmael stumbles into while he’s looking for a place to stay in New Bedford? (Aside here, The Spouter Inn looks like the Motel 6 of the Ismael’s time) Anyway it’s a negro church. The reverend is preaching about darkness. And Ishmael exits pretty quickly. I sort of pictured the scene this way — Ishmael walks into the church thinking it’s a cheap hotel. All the black faces in the congregation turn look at him — Needle Scratch — Ishmael departs.

You raise some very good points here ~

The pulpit was designed in the form of a ship's bow. It represents the ship of life and puts him in a high position which reminds you of Moses standing atop Mount Sinai preaching a fire-and-brimstone sermon to the congregants. His fiery sermon is a lesson for all to never stray from the True Path of righteousness into the Primrose Lane of sin and perdition.

The negro church ~ a segregated institution where everyone was huddled together timidly. Ish called that church "Tophet" which means "Hell" and "The Trap" because the sermon preached was one of doom and gloom. By contrast in the Whalemen's Chapel where Father Mapple preached people were "sitting apart". Too far apart for the Preacher's taste. His opening words were:

""Starboard gangway, there! side away to larboard—larboard gangway to starboard! Midships! midships!"''

In other words, 'those of you to the far right, come to the center. Those of you to the far left, come to the center!' Does this sound like a message some of us preach to extremists today?

This message is so remarkably relevant!! Every bit as much as Father Mapple's message about universal brotherhood. What a great contrast between his sermon of love and redemption as opposed to the Negro church's sermon about doom and gloom.

You mentioned that you believed Father Mapple's sermon has more relevance as the story unfolds. As one who has read the book (at least twice) I can assure you that it does. In fact, to me, the entire book is one gigantic sermon for all the world to learn from.

Sancho

11-27-2023, 06:19 PM

Excellent post, hellsapoppin. It’s posts like that that keep me coming back to this website. I went ahead and bookmarked the sermon chapter, because I’ll be coming back to it from time to time. Melville certainly seems to have a penchant for juxtaposition: the two churches/sermons, Captains Peleg and Bildad, Green Mountain landlubbers and Nantucket whalemen, Ishmael and Queequeg, I’m sure there’s more.

Totally agree, we need to listen to the old sailor/preacher — Amidships! Amidships!

I’m finding all sorts of things in this book that apply to the present day. Here’s one. I just read The Advocate chapter this morning. I was taking a pause to digest the first section of the book (from Ishmael leaving Manhattan to the Pequod heaving off in Nantucket), but I read ahead a few chapters. You see, the wife’s got remodeling the kitchen, so while I’m waiting for paint to dry or mortar to set up, I’m sitting on an orange, 5-gallon bucket, reading my kindle. But that’s not important. The Advocate is an impassioned defense of the vocation of whaling by Ishmael. Serendipitously I had CNBC (financial channel) on in the background, and Sara Eisen (presenter) was interviewing Rick Perry (former Texas governor and former Energy Secretary under Trump). Well, Perry was making the exact same argument for the fossil fuel industry that Ismael was making for the Whaling industry. It was hilarious. The more things change…

(It kinda made me like Ishmael a little less.)

hellsapoppin

11-27-2023, 08:41 PM

quoting Sancho,

It’s posts like that that keep me coming back to this website.

~ juxtaposition ~

First, thanks for the kind words.

Second, re juxtaposition, I would also add Elijah the Prophet (Ch 19) as contrasted with Sister Charity (Ch 20). The former being a scammer, a phony, all "ragged". By contrast the latter was thoughtful, conscientious, and helped to prep the vessel for its long voyage with every manner of comfort to facilitate safety and cleanliness.

Re "Advocate" Ch 24 ~ it reminded me of present day conflicts between environmentalists such as Greenpeace and the maritime industry today.

The whaling industry was condemned in its time for defiling Nature, leading to butchery of sea life which was characterized as
"unclean" and "defiling". It was even said to be undignified. Ish defends the industry by pointing out that it generates high revenues, creates many jobs, promotes a better standard of living by providing oils used for lighting in homes and in shrines. Whalers were said to be explorers who facilitated the liberation of Latin America (personally, I doubt the veracity of that statement), and expanded the known world to include Australia. Whalers were daring people who carried missionaries to the unknown world thereby spreading Christianity. It even spreads knowledge as whaling vessels were his "Yale and Harvard" colleges. The whaling profession is so great that our own Ben Franklin is descended of whalers!

One thing more: he points out that the military is far bloodier. Yet is is considered ennobled by the world.

War kills so that there is nothing noble in it. Whaling is an industry that creates. In the next chapter Ish boasts "we whalers light up the world!".

bounty

11-28-2023, 08:15 AM

sancho, tailor, a quick thought as the thread progresses---moby is often put out there as both a great novel, and a great American novel. i don't take the latter qualifier in the geographical sense, but rather a philosophical one. I hope you guys will provide a critique of moby's "greatness" at the end of the thread. and if moby is indeed a great "American" novel, I hope they'll be some insight into that also.

Sancho

11-28-2023, 02:08 PM

I am the greatest!
Fifteen times I have told the clown what round he’s going down
And this chump ain’t no different
He’ll fall in eight to prove that I’m great
And if he keeps talking jive, I’m gonna cut it to five

— Muhammad Ali, 1964, before the world championship fight with Sonny Liston

I not sure I’m the guy to pass judgment on the greatness, philosophically speaking, of a work of literature. I’ll leave that to Harold Bloom. Although I’d sure like to hear your opinion on the subject, bounty.

As for American-ness, so far I’m finding that little slice of America that was 19th century New England whaling to be fascinating. The two owners of the Pequod, Captain Peleg and Captain Bildad, illustrate how the Quaker ethic philosophy is at odds with the economic forces driving the whaling business. Peleg is a pragmatist while Bildad tries hard to maintain his religiosity. Each has chosen to live in his own reality. Who’s fooling who? I liked the scene when they’re outfitting the boat; Bildad is supervising and insists that the sailors refrain from singing any bawdy sea shanties. Of course the sailors immediately launch into one, a tune about the ladies down at Booble Alley. Bildad meanwhile sort of mumbles a psalm to himself.

Ishmael points out the hypocrisy of a man of faith engaging in the whaling industry:

For some of these same Quakers are the most sanguinary of all sailors and whale-hunters. They are fighting Quakers; they are Quakers with a vengeance.
…
Though refusing, from conscientious scruples, to bear arms against land invaders, yet himself had illimitably invaded the Atlantic and Pacific; and though a sworn foe to human bloodshed, yet had he in his straight-bodied coat, spilled tuns upon tuns of leviathan gore.
…
very probably he had long since come to the sage and sensible conclusion that a man’s religion is one thing, and this practical world quite another.

This seems all too present to me. Aren’t economic forces often at odds with what we think of as our national virtues? Isn’t capitalism often at odds with democracy? I’m thinking of Perdue Pharma and the national opioid crisis, among other things.

BTW, I’m sure you know, Sonny Liston failed to answer the bell in the seventh.

bounty

11-28-2023, 05:48 PM

that reminds me ive forgotten to look for my cliffnotes.

I have a pretty good collection of boxing biographies, including a small bunch of Muhammad ali. I was going to mention one earlier when poppin was talking about the influence of Frederick douglass on Melville---I have a book that traced the intersecting lives of joe louis and jesse owens.

your mentioning liston made me think of the second bout that created the most famous photo of ali and probably one of the most iconic sports shots. the photo and story behind it:

https://www.news.com.au/sport/sports-life/the-story-behind-the-greatest-photograph-in-sports-history/news-story/781e32670a84a2bfadcfb494eb0a924d

I hadn't remembered this but in my looking for the story above, I read a piece that according to liston, it was his corner that stopped the fight, he didn't want to.

capitalism and democracy aside (too much for this thread id argue), I don't see a contradiction between quakers being conscientious objectors when it comes to war and providing for themselves and their families by being willing to kill animals, the distinction among other things, being a biblical one. after the fall of man, god says:

"the fear and dread of you will fall on every living creature on the earth, every bird of the air, every creature that crawls on the ground, and all the fish of the sea. They are delivered into your hand. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you; just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you all things." gen 9:2-3

some Christian faiths espouse and encourage vegetarianism but to my knowledge, none of them have that as a requirement for belonging.
plus, early quaker emigration and conversion took place primarily in new England, id have to guess that so much of what went on there had to do with whaling and fishing.

given that, I disagree with something poppin said earlier, that "the whaling industry was condemned in its time for defiling Nature, leading to butchery of sea life which was characterized as "unclean" and "defiling."" its possible some people thought and said as much, but its hard to reconcile that as a general sentiment with wiki saying "The industry peaked in 1846–1852..."

the possible exception to that, clued in by the words "unclean" and "defiling" might have come from overly mosaic law/Levitical type sub-cultures, but that's contrary to the freedom given in salvation by faith...

Sancho

11-28-2023, 07:37 PM

Sancho

11-28-2023, 07:45 PM

Second, re juxtaposition, I would also add Elijah the Prophet (Ch 19) as contrasted with Sister Charity (Ch 20). The former being a scammer, a phony, all "ragged". By contrast the latter was thoughtful, conscientious, and helped to prep the vessel for its long voyage with every manner of comfort to facilitate safety and cleanliness.

Uh, I don’t know, man. Elijah, although nuttier than a sh*thouse rat, might be someone the boys should pay attention to. Just saying.

But I get where you’re coming from. Bildad’s sister, Aunt Charity, though a minor character, certainly does exude the aura of goodness. The character names are all loaded in this book, eh? She even gave me the sense of the ship’s company as family when she passed the last few items to the crew before they shoved off:

Charity had come off in a whale-boat, with her last gift — a nightcap for Stubb, the second mate, her brother-in-law, and a spare Bible for the steward
— chapter 22, Merry Christmas

Speaking of names being loaded, Elijah, to me, has Ezekiel energy.

https://youtu.be/7dpBnTThEns?si=U9M9qyTM0yH8Uckf

I don’t suppose Herman Melville had a chance to watch Pulp Fiction.

hellsapoppin

11-28-2023, 08:44 PM

Well that’s just it. The zeal of spilling “tuns upon tuns of leviathan gore” goes a tad further than providing for one’s self and one’s family, eh?

So here’s a huge caveat to anything I have to say about the Bible — I’ve never really read it. I’ve skimmed it. I’ve read random pages of it from those books the Gideons put in hotel rooms. Reading randomly is the way to go with the Bible, IMHO. Whenever I’ve tried to read it from front to back, I bog down at the “begats”. Anyway the way I understand it from Genesis, God gave man dominion over all the critters, but he also implored us to be good stewards of his creation - Earth. Give a little, take a little. Killing all the sperm whales will probably put you in an uncomfortable position at the pearly gates.

There are many verses in the Bible which command good stewardship:

https://www.biblestudytools.com/topical-verses/bible-verses-about-stewardship/
https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/what-biblical-stewardship

At creation, the mandate that God gave to humanity was for people to reflect and mirror God’s stewardship over this sphere of creation. This involves far more than religious enterprises or the church. It has to do with how we engage in scientific endeavors, how we do business, how we treat each other, how we treat animals, and how we treat the environment. That dominion over the earth is not a license to exploit, pillage, consume, or destroy the earth; it is a responsibility to exercise stewardship over our home by working and keeping it. Working and keeping one’s home means preventing it from falling apart, keeping it orderly, maintaining it, preserving it, and making it beautiful. The whole science of ecology is rooted and grounded in this principle. God didn't say, “From now on, all of your food will fall to you out of heaven.” He said, “You are to work with Me in being productive: dressing, tilling, planting, replenishing, and so on.”

Harken unto me unworthy sinners!
Do not kill baby seals, whales, or manatees!
There are better alternatives in which to satisfy thy wicked vanities!
Repent of your sins and be ye good stewards of this Precious Earth!
If ye not repent, hellacious Perdition will be thy eternal fate!!!

Danik 2016

11-28-2023, 09:55 PM

"Do not kill baby seals, whales, or manatees" I like this one.

hellsapoppin

11-28-2023, 10:43 PM

"Do not kill baby seals, whales, or manatees" I like this one.

I believe there's a tale about an Ancient Mariner who unwisely killed an albatross to his peril and to that of his mates. Been a long while since I read that poem and will have to check for what fate awaited him.

bounty

11-29-2023, 08:10 AM

Well that’s just it. The zeal of spilling “tuns upon tuns of leviathan gore” goes a tad further than providing for one’s self and one’s family, eh?

...Anyway the way I understand it from Genesis, God gave man dominion over all the critters, but he also implored us to be good stewards of his creation - Earth. Give a little, take a little. Killing all the sperm whales will probably put you in an uncomfortable position at the pearly gates.

In the end of course it was fossil fuels that killed the whaling industry not any kind of environmental outcry or human restraint.

You know, I found a picture of Sonny Liston standing over Floyd Patterson from a few years earlier that looks a lot like the one of Ali standing over him. What comes around, goes around.

I agree, the image is a gross one, but I don't agree necessarily that it goes beyond providing for one's family. not to be dismissive, but whales weigh tons, that's the work of whalers, and the ship has dozens of people on it doing likewise (providing for ones family). its especially the case if all the whale was used. though it would be interesting to read some first hand accounts of Christian whalers at the time to see how they handled the scope and if there were any prickings of conscience. that said, I think the idea of Christian stewardship of the earth and everything in it, though mentioned in genesis, is unfortunately a more modern sensibility than an older one and too many unchecked depredations have occurred throughout history.

from afar, Floyd Patterson has always struck me as a good man, id read a bio on him if I ever found one.

a quick response to albatross being mentioned. ive not read Coleridge's "the rime of the ancient mariner" so I don't know what befalls the characters in the story, but Coleridge's selection of an albatross would have been because the bird was sacred amongst seafaring people. we get the phrase "an albatross around one's neck" from that poem.

Danik 2016

11-29-2023, 10:47 AM

Here is a link to the The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (text of 1834)
BY SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE:https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43997/the-rime-of-the-ancient-mariner-text-of-1834

"He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all."

It is also about the implications of an animal hunt. But differently as the White Whale the bird in Coleridge´s poem is seen as a sort of heavenly messenger

Danik 2016

11-29-2023, 11:13 AM

I believe there's a tale about an Ancient Mariner who unwisely killed an albatross to his peril and to that of his mates. Been a long while since I read that poem and will have to check for what fate awaited him.

It´s a beautiful poem, poppin. I put the link on #40 because the poem is large. Some parallels there to Moby Dick.

Sancho

11-29-2023, 12:40 PM

I agree, guys, that is a beautiful poem.

I also agree with you, bounty, it’s a slippery slope to look at a group of people from a historical period and make a moral judgement about them using modern sensibilities and informed by a knowledge of science and history we have that they didn’t. I forget which philosopher said it, but it was something like — every generation of philosophers stands on the shoulders of the previous generation. Plato stood on Socrates’ shoulders; Aristotle stood on Plato’s shoulders; and on and on. But, you know, every once in while I think we can look at a period in history and say — those people were wrong, and they really should have known better. For instance chattel slavery in the American south at around the time Melville wrote this book. Those people were wrong and they should have known better. Talk about a selective reading of the Bible — whew! Southern clerics defended the Peculiar Institution with peculiar reasoning and with a most peculiar interpretation of the Bible. Northern clerics read the same passages in the same book and came up the opposite conclusion. I’m thinking it was that issue that caused the schism in Baptist Church and gave rise to The Southern Baptists.

So if I’m engaging in finger-pointing, the question of slavery seems like a no-brainer. Whaling, as you point out, is a bit more of a gray area. A guy like Ishmael, with a 300th stake in the endeavor, is barely making ends meet. And he gives an impassioned defense of whaling in The Advocate chapter. I just didn’t agree with his arguments. Nor did I agree with Rick Perry’s arguments in defense of the fossil fuel industry. Captains Peleg and Bildad, as the rich owners, are on shakier ground, and I think Melville points that out.

Of course anybody who finger-points at a previous generation is obliged to do a little self examination. What are we doing now that’ll have people couple of hundred years from now shaking their heads in disgust? Factory farming? Nationalistic wars? Air pollution?

Whooeee! Heavy subject. On a lighter topic — Aunt Charity. Here’s a limitation of my imagination — as I was reading about her I kept picturing Betsey Trotwood. They’re totally different characters with almost nothing in common, but Betsey is still fresh in mind. So there you go.

hellsapoppin

11-29-2023, 12:48 PM

OFF TOPIC

Can't resist talking about pro boxing. For many years it was my absolute passion in life just as it was to my dad who was a former semi-pro boxer way back in the 1930s. The sport has attracted many highly literate people over the many decades with one being Charles Francis "Socker" Coe:

https://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/image034.jpg

https://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/palm-beach-esq-historical-society-adds-photo-collection/

Fascinating human being. Great scholar, former boxer and announcer. He called some of Joe Louis's bouts. Wrote many stories one of which was said to have inspired the infamous St Valentine Day's Massacre. Despite his great fame and success in the sports and in journalism, he suddenly retired at age 50 to become a lawyer. Passed the Florida state bar exam even though he did not attend law school and became a great influence in developing the state tourist trade and real estate development.

I must confess that I cannot understand why or how so many literary scholars are attracted to pugilism as the sweet science of boxing is known. Does anyone have any idea why?

hellsapoppin

11-29-2023, 02:07 PM

It´s a beautiful poem, poppin. I put the link on #40 because the poem is large. Some parallels there to Moby Dick.

Thanks for sharing that link. I believe that I read it in Junior High School some time around 1966 or thereabouts. The one line I remembered was,

Water, water, every where,
Nor any drop to drink.

And yes, you are correct in that it parallels MD by having the same cycle of sin, penance, and redemption. In killing the innocent albatross the culprit violated a law of God or of Nature. That such ill advised violence does harm to oneself and to the natural order (and that because of this others can be harmed as well). That only in compliance with the natural order does one flourish peacefully. In fact, albatross was mentioned several time in MD. No doubt that Melville was influenced by Coleridge's poem. I wonder if the "prophet" Elijah was modeled after the mariner because he, too, had a story to tell though it was a sham (or so thought Ish) unlike the fate suffered by the mariner.

I opened up my volume of MD and had forgotten that there was Chapter LII called "The Albatross". This was a spectral vessel which looked like it survived a disaster. When its captain picks up his horn to speak with Ahab, he accidentally drops the horn and cannot communicate. This was viewed as an ominous portent by the ''insane old man''. This foretells the reader that like the mariner, Ahab awaits an unhappy fate because of his unwise urgency in wanting to kill the whale thereby violating the natural order of things.

Sancho

11-29-2023, 03:26 PM

Boxing! Hey, straying off topic adds spice to life. Although if we go down that path we’ll probably wind up reading Hemingway next. Not such a bad thing.

Ditto. Thanks for the link, Danik. I need to read it before I get the Albatross chapter in MD. That’s one of the many things I like about literature — you open one door only to find twenty more doors to open.

bounty

11-30-2023, 10:11 AM

OFF TOPIC

I must confess that I cannot understand why or how so many literary scholars are attracted to pugilism as the sweet science of boxing is known. Does anyone have any idea why?

i suggest two answers as things to consider side by side.

one is, i think literary scholars, as well as professional journalists, hobbyists and lay people of all walks of life, are attracted to a myriad of things. so its really hard to quantify or isolate boxing as being special in this regard.

but to try to answer the question more directly poppin, id put forth that the attraction to boxing in general speaks to humanity's inherent martial nature. all athletic contests have that but boxing is an elemental/fundamenal version of it. the particular attraction from scholars or other writers, possibly stems from that.

bounty

11-30-2023, 10:15 AM

as a fun aside, bing AI says this about the word "pugilism":

The word “pugilism” refers to the sport of boxing. It was derived from the Latin word “pugil,” which means “boxer” and is related to the Latin word “pugnus,” meaning “fist”. The sport of boxing was first introduced in the 23rd Olympiad of 688 BCE by the Greeks, and the ancient Romans adopted it from them. The word “pugilism” was adopted by the English language in the 18th century and has since been used to refer to both the sport of boxing and metaphorical sparring, such as in a political debate

hellsapoppin

11-30-2023, 12:41 PM

True. Boxing goes waaaaay back to the times of the ancient Greeks and Egyptians. I remember reading of Epeios in Homer's Iliad. He was so tough, nobody dared challenge him. Sherlock Holmes had been a boxer in his youth as were a great many literary characters over the years.

In modern times Jack London, Hemingway, AJ Leibling, George Plimpton, Norman Mailer, and "Socker" Coe were obsessed with it. Heck, even Joyce Carol Oates was every bit as obsessed as they were.

There's something about that great sport that attracts intellectuals so it's no surprise that a great many movies (as well as good fiction) were made about the subject.

Sancho

11-30-2023, 06:16 PM

Haven’t found boxing in Moby yet, but Stubb, one of the mates, weighs in on getting hit with a fist as opposed to a cane:

‘Why,’ thinks I, ‘what’s the row? It’s not a real leg, only a false one.’ And there’s a mighty difference between a living thump and a dead thump. That’s what makes a blow from the hand, Flask, fifty times more savage to bear than a blow from a cane. The living member — that makes the living insult, my little man.

So we finally meet Ahab, and the Pequod is already a few days out to sea. Ishmael sees him standing on the quarter deck, like an Oak, steadying himself by wedging his peg leg into a divot on the deck. Ishmael notes how once at sea Ahab almost never sleeps, he’s always topside.

Stubb approaches Ahab and asks him, in so many words, to take it easy thumping across the deck with his whalebone peg leg because it’s noisy and is keeping the sailors below awake. Ahab basically tells him to go pound sand. Stubb retreats but is indignant about how the captain spoke to him. And like so many men who get put in their place at work and then go home and vent to their wife — “shoulda seen what I did to this clown at work today, hon” — Stubb whines to Flask about it. Flask, one of the other mates, tells him — “let it go, man. He’s just big-dicking you — something like that. Anyway, Ahab had never even touched Stubb. He didn’t have to, evidently. Stubb’s encounter with Ahab bothered him so much that he had a dream about it. He dreamt Ahab was kicking him with his prosthetic leg, and that’s what gave rise to his convo with Flask, and his theory that it’s worse to be punched than to be caned.

Okay, so, I took a few liberties paraphrasing what Flask said to Stubb. What he really said was:

No, you were kicked by a great man, and with a beautiful ivory leg, Stubb. It’s an honor;

bounty

12-01-2023, 12:41 PM

I don't recollect any boxing about the Pequod, or anywhere else in the book, but that, and what you posted above Sancho reminds of how history, and therefore seafaring literature and cinema is full of harsh corporal disciplinary measures, especially in the british navy but also on merchant ships.

back to the point of boxing and intellectuals---I recently had occasion to share this quote from Thucydides:

“The Nation that makes a huge distinction between its scholars and its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and its fighting done by fools.”

Sancho

12-01-2023, 03:48 PM

Haha. Good Greek General quote. Sounds like our adventures in Vietnam. Although now, it seems the pendulum has swung. We’ve got an 80 something president going to a war zone while “warriors” are sitting in trailers in Nevada flying Predator drones and pushing buttons that kill people thousands of miles away. It’s bizarre.

Anyway, ta-da, I found boxing in Moby Dick. After his big speech, and the nailing of the Spanish coin to the mast, Ahab is ruminating in his cabin:

I now prophesy that I will dismember my dismemberer. Now, then, be the prophet and the fulfiller one. That’s more than ye, ye great gods, ever were. I laugh and hoot at ye, ye cricket-players, ye pugilists, ye deaf Burkes and blinded Bendigoes! I will not say as schoolboys do to bullies — Take some one of your own size; don’t pommel me! No, ye’ve knocked me down, and I am up again; but ye have run and hidden.

Ahab, it seems, has a low opinion of boxers.

Meanwhile, topside, the crew is reacting to Ahab’s speech. It’s a fun chapter. The boys are about three sheets to wind and singing bawdy sea shanties. A storm is approaching. And then racism rears its ugly head when a Spanish sailor disrespects an African harpooner (Dagoo) and a boxing match almost breaks out (foiled by the approaching storm).

…look yonder, boys, there’s another in the sky lurid — like, ye see, all else pitch black.

DAGGOO — What of that? Who’s afraid of black’s afraid of me! I’m quarried out of it!

SPANISH SAILOR (Aside.) — He wants to bully, ah!— the old grudge makes me touchy (Advancing.) Aye, harpooneer, thy race is the undeniable dark side of mankind — devilish dark at that. No offence.

DAGGOO (Grimly) —None.

ST. JAGO’S SAILOR — That Spaniard’s mad or drunk. But that can’t be, or else in his one case our old Mogul’s fire-waters are somewhat long in working.

5TH NANTUCKET SAILOR — What’s that I saw — lightning? Yes.

SPANISH SAILOR — No; Daggoo showing his teeth.

DAGGOO (Springing) — Swallow thine, mannikin! White skin, white liver!

SPANISH SAILOR (Meeting him) — Knife thee heartily! big frame, small spirit!

ALL — A row! a row! a row!

TASHTEGO (With a whiff) — A row a’low, and a row aloft — Gods and men — both brawlers! Humph!

BELFAST SAILOR —A row! arrah a row! The Virgin be blessed, a row! Plunge in with ye!

ENGLISH SAILOR — Fair play! Snatch the Spaniard’s knife! A ring, a ring!

OLD MANX SAILOR — Ready formed. There! the ringed horizon. In that ring Cain struck Abel. Sweet work, right work! No? Why then, God, mad’st thou the ring?

MATE’S VOICE FROM THE QUARTER-DECK —Hands by the halyards! in top-gallant sails! Stand by to reef topsails! ALL The squall! the squall! jump, my jollies! (They scatter.)

hellsapoppin

12-01-2023, 06:37 PM

Sancho,

I found boxing in Moby Dick. After his big speech, and the nailing of the Spanish coin to the mast, Ahab is ruminating in his cabin:

I now prophesy that I will dismember my dismemberer. Now, then, be the prophet and the fulfiller one. That’s more than ye, ye great gods, ever were. I laugh and hoot at ye, ye cricket-players, ye pugilists, ye deaf Burkes and blinded Bendigoes! I will not say as schoolboys do to bullies — Take some one of your own size; don’t pommel me! No, ye’ve knocked me down, and I am up again; but ye have run and hidden.
Ahab, it seems, has a low opinion of boxers.

Meanwhile, topside, the crew is reacting to Ahab’s speech. It’s a fun chapter. The boys are about three sheets to wind and singing bawdy sea shanties. A storm is approaching. And then racism rears its ugly head when a Spanish sailor disrespects an African harpooner (Dagoo) and a boxing match almost breaks out (foiled by the approaching storm).

…look yonder, boys, there’s another in the sky lurid — like, ye see, all else pitch black.

DAGGOO — What of that? Who’s afraid of black’s afraid of me! I’m quarried out of it!

SPANISH SAILOR (Aside.) — He wants to bully, ah!— the old grudge makes me touchy (Advancing.) Aye, harpooneer, thy race is the undeniable dark side of mankind — devilish dark at that. No offence.

DAGGOO (Grimly) —None.

ST. JAGO’S SAILOR — That Spaniard’s mad or drunk. But that can’t be, or else in his one case our old Mogul’s fire-waters are somewhat long in working ...

Great excerpts. I had forgotten this episode in that classic book. We see Ahab's soliloquy in which he appears to challenge Nature or Nature's God much like Nebuchadnezzar drinking, boasting, and then defying the biblical Jehovah to his peril. He refused to listen to wise counsel (from Daniel, I believe it was) and influenced his soldiers to do the same all to their doom. Ahab also defies wise counsel (given to him by Starbucks), gets his men into a massive drunken reverie, they pledge their undying loyalty to him, and, as we are to learn, do as to their peril as well. Both men have a very troubling dream, not realizing that it was a prophesy -- that they should turn back from their evils ways, listen to wise counsel, and adhere to good principle. Neither does so. The result is disaster for all.

bounty

12-02-2023, 07:41 AM

Haha. Good Greek General quote...

im reading an old western called the silver desert by ernest haycox. there is large ranch and spread in Nevada called "the barrier" and there are some bad guys, led by a fellow named buffalo, who are trying to ruin it. one of the ranch's outposts, manned by a fellow named bill, was attacked by the bad guys and the ranch's owner, his foreman (matt), and some others went out to render aid:

"the depards didn't think up this mischief, it was buffalo of course."

matt strang waggled his head. "we're going to have a whole hell of a lot of grief up here in this broken country. I feel it. bill spiel's not the man you want to handle this camp four district. he could've made this three men do against six if he'd had nerve enough. he reads too much."

"shouldn't be a handicap."

"you cant scrap with your fingers in a book..."

Sancho

12-02-2023, 01:16 PM

Ya know, I was just considering making my next read an old western, a Zane Grey or a Louis L’Amour. I haven’t read too much in that genre. Lonesome Dove is the only one I can think of. As for the Greek General, Thucydides was required reading for several courses I took while in the military. I gravitated more towards Herodotus. I’d rather read about the man on the street than armies and war. The Histories is a book you can pick up, read several pages at random, and find something interesting.

I’m nearing the half way point in Moby Dick. Tashtego has spotted a pod of whales. The boats are lowered, and the boys lay chase. Turns out Ahab has a ringer crew. We sort of know there are stowaways onboard, but until now we don’t know who they are. Ahab has a crew of Filipinos and a big ole turbaned fellow named Fedallah, all wearing black. WTF?

But first, back to Ahab’s speech to the crew on the quarter deck. I saw it as tactical. It also told me it was his intention from the get-go to make this voyage all about revenge. He never had any intention of whaling for the investors. Tactically it was all about getting the sailors in his corner, which would make it just about impossible for the mates to mutiny. Starbuck, 1st mate, is caught off guard by Ahab’s speech and is only able to mount a weak defense. Then he caves pretty quickly, or more accurately he just holds his tongue. Stubb, 2nd mate, is mute, probably because Ahab had already b*tch-slapped him in an earlier encounter and thus Stubb is gun-shy (tragic mixed metaphor there). And finally, Flask, 3rd mate. Where’s Flask? Who knows. Flask is MIA. He’s probably inspecting his fingernails while all this is going on.

From Ahab’s inner dialog earlier, it appears he has totally gone over to the dark side. I think at one time he was probably a good Quaker, but since the whale bit off his leg he has lost his faith. He even jabs his thumb into the eye of God and declares himself the prophet and the fulfiller. When Starbuck calls him out on his blasphemy, Ahab replies:

Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I’d strike the sun if it insulted me.

The chapter about Moby himself is where we see this crucial moment:

His three boats stove around him, and oars and men both whirling in the eddies; one captain, seizing the line-knife from his broken prow, had dashed at the whale, as an Arkansas duellist at his foe, blindly seeking with a six inch blade to reach the fathom-deep life of the whale. That captain was Ahab. And then it was, that suddenly sweeping his sickle-shaped lower jaw beneath him, Moby Dick had reaped away Ahab’s leg, as a mower a blade of grass in the field. No turbaned Turk, no hired Venetian or Malay, could have smote him with more seeming malice.

Two images images popped into my mind here: First, Hugh Glass in The Revenant battling Mama grizzly with a Bowie knife. Second, the bishop in Caddy Shack losing his religion after almost playing the best 9 holes he ever played.

There was a storm involved here too. Bill Murray is playing Ishmael, I suppose:

https://youtu.be/Pe5eL8LQdY0?si=QmQTLhUWzhsIttvc

Later at the bar:

https://youtu.be/DEKyx_eTxBQ?si=FzswKtngaaHgGmeB

What can I say? I’m a simple man.
BTW Hugh Glass, though near-fatally injured, kills mama grizzly.

bounty

12-02-2023, 03:14 PM

ive enjoyed every l'amour book ive read, but zane grey is my favorite. I also like max brand and can heartily recommend him too.

that's an interesting point about Ahab's tactics.

caddyshack is one of the best movies ever. "id keep playing, I don't think the heavy stuffs going come down for quite a while."

some trivia:

In the scene where the Bishop (played by veteran actor Henry Wilcoxon) is having his best round of golf ever during a thunderstorm, he misses an easy putt, looks skyward and yells "rat farts!", and is immediately struck down by a bolt of lightning. The background music in this scene was from The Ten Commandments, in which Wilcoxon played the part of Pentaur.

back to Ishmael, I've still be going through my far side collection, and was reminded there are at least a few moby dick ones. see the attachments.

hellsapoppin

12-02-2023, 11:05 PM

Major Kong rides the bomb in Dr Strangelove:

9968

https://media.newyorker.com/photos/5909515e6552fa0be682bce9/16:9/w_1280,c_limit/dr-strangelove-still-580.jpg

Ishmael rides the dolphins:

With a frigate's anchors for my bridle-bitts and fasces of harpoons for spurs, would I could mount that whale and leap the topmost skies, to see whether the fabled heavens with all their countless tents really lie encamped beyond my mortal sight!

Ch 57, Of Whales In Paint ... In Stars

hellsapoppin

12-03-2023, 12:19 AM

White - the color which usually represents beauty, innocence, purity, goodness, and virtue. However, in MD the color is used to denote death, evil, sin, and every manner of bad things.

Ch 14 Nantucket ~ the term "wight" (pronounced white) is used to represent inhabitants of that locale. We are told throughout the book that this is hardly a Paradise or Heaven and that, in fact, it is a perilous place. Among several definitions that it has, the word "wight" a reanimated corpse or zombie brought back to life by sorcery.

Ch 38 Ahab ~ carries the mark of death. The "whitish" tree stump he wears as a leg which made him an "old sepulchral man" who was "dead" "grim" who wore a "crucifixion in his face" "seated upon an ivory stool" and sailed during the "dead wintry bleakness.

Ch 41 Moby Dick ~ described throughout as evil. He is called here the White Whale possessed of "ferocity {of} unexampled malignity {causing} fatalities, disasters, death ... deadliest ill."

Ch 42 Whiteness of the Whale ~ "It was the whiteness of the whale that most appalled me" says Ish. He says that usually whiteness represents mythical good. But instead, in the real world it represents evil such as white Europeans evilly conquering militarily dark skinned races world wide, the whiteness of the albatross casts evil spells (see also the chapter on the albatross), the Albino man repels all, in the seas the White Squall foretells danger, the murderous White Hoods of Ghent, white represents pallor of the dead, peculiar apparitions, White Friar or White Nun are soul less, the White Sea is spectral, "the tall pale man" of European legend is a terrible phantom, the snow filled Andes mountains are dangerous and deadly, etc. Whiteness represents a leprous 'palsied universe'.

Ch 119 The Candles ~ We see St Elmo's Fire whose pallidness revealed a "ghostly light" which portends fiery doom.

Great irony that while the world usually calls white the color of good and black the color of evil, Ishmael tells us just the opposite {SPOILER ALERT}. As most of you know, Ish lives because he is saved when he rests upon the coffin of his black brother Quee.

Now let's go to pro boxing.

Please recall Muhammed Ali's interview on angel food cake being white while devil food cake being black:

https://www.facebook.com/Funnews7/videos/the-angel-food-cake-was-the-white-cake-and-the-devil-food-cake-was-the-chocolate/1061314310928646/

Oh the irony!

hellsapoppin

12-03-2023, 12:32 AM

Oh, I forgot that in Ch 59 ~ Squid --- a gigantic white squid (furlongs in length and breath) called a "white ghost" and a "monster" appears. Again, its color again represents evil. It scares the sailors especially Starbucks who repeatedly gave warnings of impending danger but did not scare Ahab who persisted in continuing the mission.

Sancho

12-03-2023, 12:07 PM

Haha. I think Gary Larson may struggle with writer’s block from time to time. That panel is just too on-point. I’ve got a collection of his in a box in my basement. When I’m trying to organize down there, I’ll come across it and then I don’t get anything else done. As for Caddyshack, I’d say there’s a handful of movies from that era without which guys my age wouldn’t know how to act. And wouldn’t be able to communicate with each other. So we got that going for us, which is nice. Stripes is another. Dr. Strangelove, although from an earlier era, is another. Major Kong was no Ahab, though. He was a pretty good aircraft commander. So good, in fact, he wound up kicking off a nuclear holocaust. It was B.G. Jack T. Ripper that had gone full Ahab.

I think chapters like Of Whales In Paint are a good example of why some people hate this book. Ishmael has a penchant for going off on a tangent and musing about this thing or that instead of getting on with the action. — Yeah, yeah, yeah, the sky is blue and the sea is too, but what happens NEXT? Actually I kind of like those chapters. Among other things it gives the reader the sense of all the dead time sailors had on the ship. And some of his descriptions are amazing. Here Fedallah has taken up the watch in the crow’s nest at night. He wears a snow-white turban:

You may think with what emotions, then, the seamen beheld this old Oriental perched aloft at such unusual hours; his turban and the moon, companions in one sky.

This is an action sequence, but what a visual, eh? The whale boats are in hot pursuit:

the brief suspended agony of the boat, as it would tip for an instant on the knife-like edge of the sharper waves, that almost seemed threatening to cut it in two; the sudden profound dip into the watery glens and hollows; the keen spurrings and goadings to gain the top of the opposite hill; the headlong, sled-like slide down its other side;— all these, with the cries of the headsmen and harpooneers, and the shuddering gasps of the oarsmen, with the wondrous sight of the ivory Pequod bearing down upon her boats with outstretched sails, like a wild hen after her screaming brood;—

I do like a good barnyard simile.

You know, I think Muhammad Ali could’ve written The Whiteness Of The Whale chapter. That was an awesome clip.

hellsapoppin

12-03-2023, 12:39 PM

You know, I think Muhammad Ali could’ve written The Whiteness Of The Whale chapter. That was an awesome clip.

You get a major thumbs up for that one!

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41PzW6gu3tL._UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg

Sancho

12-03-2023, 01:11 PM

Well, thumbs up right back at’cha, my friend. This website and you-all have made reading Moby Dick so much more enjoyable than it would’ve been otherwise.

Danik 2016

12-03-2023, 08:01 PM

From me too!

hellsapoppin

12-04-2023, 01:45 AM

Thanks for those endorsement above. Indeed, re-reading portions of this striking book has been fun for me as well. :hurray:

The Pequod ~ what does this name symbolize?

The Pequots were a doomed tribe of Native Americans. They suffered from war and the ravishes of pestilence. Few survived and most of those who did intermingled with other Algonquin tribes in the Northeast. The vessel which is named after these doomed people is comprised of an assorted set of ne'er-do-wells with sea worthies of various backgrounds. Each contributes to the vessels functions with a great many of them named after biblical characters. The boat meets and deals with other sailing ships which shows that the Pequod and its amalgamation of cultures serves as microcosm for the world. Thus, as in the Bible which is repeatedly referenced in the novel, when in compliance with Nature's law it succeeds. When in violation thereof, it is doomed. Being that it is under the command of an evil character in Ahab, its destiny would become ill fated. Bottom line being that the name of the vessel is prophetic ~ it spells doom for itself and its crew.

hellsapoppin

12-04-2023, 02:03 AM

Forgot to add one thing: that, indeed, the few Pequots who survived did so through integration with other tribes or with the general white population. Bear in mind that Frederick Douglass's sermons were all about integration. That America would not survive unless and until society ended slavery and became integrated:

In its primary applications, Douglass envisioned the Afro-American effort to INTEGRATE as an effort to cultivate the practical virtues required for success in America's political economy, along with a wholehearted patriotic identification with the American nation in its core principles and its historical strivings ...

https://www.google.com/search?q=frederick+douglass+called+for+integration&rlz=1CAKSOU_enUS1067&oq=frederick+douglass+called+for+integration&aqs=chrome..69i57.8225j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Perhaps Melville's use of the name Pequod may have included this type of symbolic implication as well.

Sancho

12-04-2023, 11:49 AM

I was thinking along the same lines as to what the name of the ship would spell for the crew. Captain Peleg sort of jovially mentions the tribe, but doesn't give his reasoning for naming the ship after it. Seems dark. Maybe it’s like telling an actor to “break a leg” right before they go on stage.

Speaking of ship names, the story of the Town-Ho is an odd one, and told in an odd way. A strapping young sailor, Steelkilt, has been singled out by the 1st mate, Radney, for extra cruelty. Steelkilt is a well-liked, ,charismatic fellow, and Radney is a mousey little guy with short-man energy. Anyway to make a long story short, (and it’s a long story) Steelkilt can’t take it anymore and nearly kills Radney with one punch — drives his jaw back into his face. Nautical justice is performed; Steelkilt attempts mutiny; mutiny fails; Moby Dick kills Radney; much of the crew abandons ship at the next port. The story of course is much more nuanced than that and is delivered in the book as Ishmael retelling the story years later to a bunch of Spanish patricians in Lima. Odd. Okay we all know how this book turns out, so the story of the Town-Ho seems like a pretty straight forward foreshadowing of things to come for the Pequod, but what would it mean to Ahab and his crew? Ahab already believes the white whale is an evil force. It seems to me, from his perspective, the experience of the Town-Ho just bolsters that belief in his damaged mind and makes it that much more important for him to kill the evil beast.

Side note here: I can’t help but to giggle in a Beavis and Butthead sort of way when I read names like the Town-Ho, or when they talk about the aroma of golden sperm. Melville had to know stuff like that would crack up the ten-year-old boy inside of all of us.

What he probably didn’t know was how uncomfortable it would be us to read the rendering of Fleece’s speech in the chapter about Stubb’s dinner. Fleece is the ship’s cook. He is an old black man and his speech is laid out phonetically in the chapter. Additionally his treatment by Stubb in that chapter is highly condescending in a racist sort of way. At any rate, I’d say most readers in the 21st century choke on Stubb’s dinner. I don’t want to too hypocritical here, I mean I’m giggling when I read about the Town-Ho. We’ve still got a ways to go Mr. Douglas.

bounty

12-04-2023, 06:20 PM

think you'll watch any of the half-dozen or so movies/tv series from the book?

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 01:21 AM

think you'll watch any of the half-dozen or so movies/tv series from the book?

Nothing quite compares with this gem:

https://prod-images.tcm.com/Master-Profile-Images/mobydick1956.17660.jpg

But somehow, I've got to watch the Barrymore version from 1930. He was considered by many the greatest actor of his time so that he must have made it worth while:

https://images.mubicdn.net/images/film/144761/cache-151375-1465908485/image-w1280.jpg?size=800x

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 01:34 AM

Couldn't find the 1930 talkie but did find the Sea Beast (silent, 1926) which was based on MD:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7-f7U3Co74

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7-f7U3Co74

Will watch later on ...

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 02:28 AM

Originally Posted by Sancho
I was thinking along the same lines as to what the name of the ship would spell for the crew. Captain Peleg sort of jovially mentions the tribe, but doesn't give his reasoning for naming the ship after it. Seems dark. Maybe it’s like telling an actor to “break a leg” right before they go on stage.

Speaking of ship names, the story of the Town-Ho is an odd one, and told in an odd way ...

I believe the name "town ho" implies "homeward bound". In living up to its name, its crew is spared the unhappy fate suffered by the men of the Pequod.

This episode is so much like Billy Budd both of which deal with injustice, how one bears with it, and the "justice" that results. Innocent as he was, Billy Budd was doomed through an injustice that was no fault of his own. But Steelkilt is spared because of the revenge, the justice brought on by (of all things) Moby Dick who was an avenger of injustices! Indeed, it "seemed obscurely to involve with the whale a certain wondrous, inverted visitation of one of those so called judgments of God which at times are said to overtake men."

The chapter also deals with an age old conflict of free will vs determinism = are things fated or are they the result of one's willful actions? We are told, "the predestinated mate coming still closer {to the evil Radney} ... the fool had been branded for the slaughter by the gods ... A strange fatality pervades the whole career of these events, as if verily mapped out before the world itself was chartered."

The one thing both Billy Budd and Steelkilt had in common was that they were both good looking. Not sure why Melville gave us that description.

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 02:41 AM

One of the most underrated songs in the Rock & Roll era:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PMNGG_C-CA

I sailed an ocean, unsettled ocean
Through restful waters and deep commotion
Often frightened, unenlightened
Sail on, sail on sailor
I wrest the waters, fight Neptune's waters
Sail through the sorrows of life's marauders
Unrepenting, often empty
Sail on, sail on sailor
Caught like a sewer rat alone but I sail
Bought like a crust of bread, but oh do I wail
Seldom stumble, never crumble
Try to tumble, life's a rumble
Feel the stinging I've been given
Never ending, unrelenting
Heartbreak searing, always fearing
Never caring, persevering
Sail on, sail on, sailor
I work the seaways, the gale-swept seaways
Past shipwrecked daughters of wicked waters
Uninspired, drenched and tired
Wail on, wail on, sailor
Always needing, even bleeding
Never feeding all my feelings
Damn the thunder, must I blunder
There's no wonder all I'm under
Stop the crying and the lying
And the sighing and my dying
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor
Sail on, sail on sailor

Music wise, everything Brian Wilson touched turned to gold. He was an absolute perfectionist who would record, and re-record every song innumerable times until he got it right. There has also been a very spiritual dimension to his songs which have largely been overlooked. To me, the man is a National treasure.

"Sail on sailor" means, quoting Captain Kirk, to boldly go where no man has gone before. That despite all hardships and all obstructions, persist and go forth. The men of the Pequod and the Town Ho did just that.

tailor STATELY

12-05-2023, 02:49 AM

Sancho

12-05-2023, 04:28 AM

Woo-Hoo. If we’re doing music, there ain’t too much in this world that doesn’t remind me of a Grateful Dead tune.

Ship Of Fools:
https://youtu.be/CQP1NsbeYVg?si=W70wEV0paUNVAhff

Went to see the captain
Strangest I could find
Laid my proposition down
Laid it on the line

I won't slave for beggar's pay
Likewise gold and jewels
But I would slave to learn the way
To sink your ship of fools

As for the movie, I’ll probably skip it. After reading the book I’m almost always disappointed with a screen version. That said, I’ve already started noticing “Moby-isms” in film, TV, old hippy music, and generally in some pretty unusual places. Just the other day, for instance, an Ahab-type fellow cut me off on the I-5. Additionally the next chance I get I’ll visit a maritime museum. I’m going to be in Boston for a couple of days next week, so I thought I’d visit the USS Constitution.

bounty

12-05-2023, 10:40 AM

i enjoy watching the movie first and reading the book afterwards. or, and i just did this recently with misery, going back and forth between the two.

i just got curious about the singer "moby" and found out his middle name is "melville."

"Richard Melville Hall was born September 11, 1965, in the neighborhood of Harlem in Manhattan, New York City. He is an only child of Elizabeth McBride (née Warner), a medical secretary, and James Frederick Hall, a chemistry professor... His father gave him the nickname Moby three days after his birth as his parents considered the name Richard too large for a newborn baby."

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 10:56 AM

Big Doors fan... enjoyed their sea shanty :)

Not a Beach Boys fan... in fact I didn't even know this was their song, but I will add this to the only other song I like of theirs: Good Vibrations :)

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor

Gosh! You brought back some memories for me as we had a great touring homage in NYC to "Crystal Ship" going way back to the late 1970s. I tried to look it up online and was astonished to see that it is still on!

https://allevents.in/new%20york/crystal-ship-a-tribute-to-the-doors/10000728506391227

I just cannot believe this is still playing. GREAT song. GREAT group. Everyone should read this excellent book:

https://www.google.com/search?q=no+one+here+gets+alive+book&rlz=1CAKSOU_enUS1067&oq=no+one+here+gets+alive+book&aqs=chrome..69i57.5577j0j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

No One Here Gets Out Alive ~ "No one here gets out alive" tells the story of Jim Morrison, from when he was a kid, moving around a lot with his family, due to his father being in the Navy, to when he was a teenager, becoming The Doors' singer and finally dying aged 27 in Paris.

hellsapoppin

12-05-2023, 06:14 PM

This was probably the most criticized portion of the book. Often dismissed as a seemingly meaningless digression or pedantic departure from the novel, it adds a scientific dimension to the whale which up to now was viewed as a satanic menace from the depths of Hell. Further, it legitimizes Ishmael as a explorer of the universe, if that makes any sense. He brings up the Bible's Leviathan (Book of Job) and the matter as to whether a whale is a fish (perhaps a reference to Jonah and the big fish ~ see "Sermon" Ch 9).

Then he acts like a new Adam in the Garden of Eden by naming those creatures he sees in his world. In fact, the chapter is structured a lot like the Bible is in that it has Book 1 or Book 2, Chapter such-and-such, etc. He says Cetology is an incomplete science and that his knowledge or capabilities in it are limited. Then he ends the chapter by writing that his research and writing on the subject remain incomplete. Perhaps he suggests that more work or more adventures are to follow.

Seems to me that this chapter is a follow up to the book's opening where there is an Etymology and Extracts which include definitions and classifications. The fact that this follow up was included in Ch 32 rather than immediately after the opening was a wise one in that a reader would not have known of the whale's monstrous reputation until after reading the chapters that followed that opening.

In the beginning of the book, Ishmael tells us he was seeking adventure. That he was drawn by Fate to go ship hoy and that the reputed menace of the whale helped draw him to this perilous voyage. But it is also clear that he is seeking knowledge and his references to noted scholarly writings demonstrate this. The chapter does show that he has accumulated a considerable amount of knowledge though it is incomplete and he remains unfulfilled.

Sancho

12-05-2023, 08:01 PM

Ya know, I liked the Cetology chapter. I liked reading the cutting edge science of the day. The details and comparisons of whales might get a little tedious when they've got a sperm whale head hoisted up on one side of the ship and a right whale head on the other. In general though the information-type chapters act as break between the wild-action chapters or deep-philosophy chapters. Kinda gives the reader a break. Besides it's clear Melville is passionate about his subject, and it's always fun to listen to someone who's excited about what he's talking about, even if the subject is a little nerdy, even if it's something I care nothing about. It's just fun to be carried away by somebody else's enthusiasm. When Ishmael starts going on and on about whales, I can't help but to be reminded of John C. Reilly in What's Eating Gilbert Grape going on and on about the Burger Barn.

bounty

12-05-2023, 08:05 PM

Sancho I just posted on the old "sport desk" thread. I hope you'll take a look.

but I wanted to share something from there, here, in hope that more people (all five or six of us) might see it:

I think one of the absolute best things ive recently discovered on YouTube is a channel called "like stories of old" and I think anyone who likes stories would do really well to check it out.

https://www.youtube.com/@LikeStoriesofOld

the one im watching now is "Venturing into Sacred Space | Archetype of the Magician"

I recently watched "Lighting the Beacons, and Other Perfect Movie Metaphors" and it was fantastic.

Sancho

12-05-2023, 09:09 PM

Sounds fun. I'll check it out. It does seem like there's only a handful of people on this website any more. Honestly though seems like forums are atrophying all over the web. I'll go on forums seeking info on car maintenance or dendrology or some darned thing and there's a few folks who post things regularly and then there's a bunch of lurkers seeking answers to specific questions. On this website it's usually folks looking for answers to homework questions. Fair warning here — anybody looking for help on their homework, El Sancho was a C- student. And that was on a good day.

Yes, well, so anyway, speaking of the cutting-edge science of the day in Moby Dick, I was sort of wondering if Ishmael would ever get around to the phrenology of whales. And, WHOOP, dere it is, Chapter 80, The Nut.

Danik 2016

12-05-2023, 11:13 PM

Thanks for the link, bounty,I'm going to check it out.
Forums are drying out indeed Sancho probably because of the social nets. I think the homeworkers of Litnet have also wandered away. What I sometimes see is spammers, very eager to enter the forum.

As for old Ismael, I would like to have contributed more, but I forgot almost all, including the humorous early chapters.

bounty

12-06-2023, 07:10 AM

I hope you guys will indeed visit "like stories of old." I find myself wishing the guy would put all his narration into a book.

here's the book im planning to get that have inspired some of the videos:

https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/the-hero-within-six-archetypes-we-live-by_carol-s-pearson/262640/#edition=2339066&idiq=1004430

Sancho---have you been to boston before? theres a fair amount of revolutionary war stuff you might enjoy visiting.

hellsapoppin

12-06-2023, 02:13 PM

Interesting chapter. Ahab and his officers settle down to dinner - they are described in royal terms with words such as sultan, Emir, Grand Turk, as "King" Ahab. They are served much like royal dinners equated with terms such as "Coronation" and Imperial Electors. All except Flask enjoy a generous portion of the food. I wonder if the name "flask" was intentional as it appears to be symbolize an empty vessel or container. It is shown that he was the last one served, got the least amount of food, immediately stopped eating when Ahab did so, did not dare reach for the butter as if he was of an inferior rank and situated here well above his rank, and he left the table hungry. "Flask once admitted in private, that ever since he had arisen to the dignity of an officer, from that moment h had never known what it was to be otherwise than hungry". Up to that time he had been well fed and now longs for the day that he could return to such fulfilling times. Everyone remains in total silence as this was how Ahab had his food. Everything is so rigid, so regimented. One last note here: Starbucks, the most rebellious of the officer gets the biggest portion. Flask the most submissive gets the smallest portion. Great irony when you think about it.

Then the harpooners enter to eat. By contrast, they are a garrulous lot, take great delight in teasing servant Dough Boy who hides away to avoid the bullying, and they eat like the "barbarians" that they are.

Remarkable contrast!

Ahab leaves the cabin and goes to his private quarters, the barbarians to theirs, and Dough Boy to his small closet. The cabin is no place for socializing as "in the cabin was no companionship". Chapter ends with an image of a solitary bear in a den hibernating for winter in "gloom".

And what of the regular crew members? We never know ...

Sancho

12-06-2023, 03:04 PM

I liked that scene, too. It was like a hoity-toity, black tie dinner with a wait staff and world-class cook serving food nobody really wants to eat and the only sound in the dining room being the occasional clink of a fork against a plate. Meanwhile the staff is out back, grilling up some juicy burgers and yukking it up. Or maybe it was little like scene in Don Quixote where Sancho finally gets his Isla and they’re serving him a meal that’s fit for the governor, but before he gets a chance to take a bite they snatch it away from him. Or maybe, just maybe, the contrast was like Jake and Elwood in the French restaurant trying to get Mr Fabulous back in the band.

“Wrong glass, sir.”
https://youtu.be/WJY2VnTcfK8?si=uTrskyrKV2wS4TL1

Thanks, bounty, actually I go to Boston semi-regularly. I mean, c’mon, that’s where Fenway is. I’ve seen the USS Constitution float by, but I’ve never been on it. I’m not even sure the museum is open this time of year. If it’s closed I’ll just have to go to Mike’s in the North End. I know they’re open. This time of year there’ll be a line of people down the sidewalk waiting for cannolis. A couple of years ago a coworker and I went to the Tea Party Museum in Boston. Tea Party in the sense of Sam Adams and the boys dumping several tons of East India tea into the Boston harbor, not the moron faction of the Republican party waving their guns around. Anyway after the museum we did a very American thing: we got COFFEE. At a STARBUCKS.

Speaking of Starbuck, I’m about three quarters of the way through Moby and the 1st mate has been pretty quiet. He stays in the background, the steady voice of reason. And speaking of the U.S. war for independence, Melville/Ishmael seems to have a low opinion of Europeans. First there’s the inept German whaler, the Jurgenfrau that can’t seem to catch a whale, then there’s the French whaler, the Rosebud that is moored to a stinking, rotting whale carcass, trying to extract oil from it. I wonder if we’ll come across a British ship.

You know, come to think of it, I need to dig through the books in my basement and find the most low-brow among them. Then I’ll affix them with Book Crossing stickers and spread them around Harvard’s campus next week. It’s only a short walk from were we stay over the Charles to Cambridge.

hellsapoppin

12-06-2023, 03:20 PM

Sancho,

I went to the Tea Party Museum in Boston. Tea Party in the sense of Sam Adams and the boys dumping several tons of East India tea into the Boston harbor, not the moron faction of the Republican party waving their guns around. Anyway after the museum we did a very American thing: we got COFFEE. At a STARBUCKS.

Starbucks? According to Boston Dad that is sacrilege if you're from Boston. According to him, you MUST go to Dunky Dunks:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyFfLBbNRNQ

Sancho

12-06-2023, 04:08 PM

Haha! Get that kid a Seahawks jersey. I live in the PNW. I’ll have a Venti Pike’s. (20 ounce coffee) Stumptown Coffee works too. Lodge Dunkin? P’tooey!

bounty

12-06-2023, 07:53 PM

if you will be there again in the future for a fair length of time, after reading moby, you might enjoy venturing over to Nantucket and hitting up the whaling museum there.

bounty

12-06-2023, 08:00 PM

when I read gone with the wind not too long ago I used an already existing thread on the book. seeing the old moby threads posted below in "similar threads" reminded me of that and I just went and visited one:

"Need help with Moby Dick.

"Okay, maybe I am just not smart enough for this book but why does anybody think Moby Dick was a good book. I seriously think it should have been titled everything you never wanted to know about early 19th century whaling.

"There is just about enough story development in this giant book to make a small novella or a large short story. But good God, does any non-cetation bioligist want to read hundreds of pages about the difference between butchering different kinds of whales? Or how about the long winded lecture in which we learn of property laws when a dead whale with harpoons in it washes up on a beach (an event that does not even happen in the story proper.) Sure Ahab is an intresting character, but he does not make it worth it.

"Somebody please tell me why this is a good book."

more later...

Sancho

12-07-2023, 12:37 AM

That right there is the main criticism of the book — too much detail about stuff that doesn't matter. A close second is — the prose is way overblown. Seems like it's been getting both criticisms regularly since it was published. I look at this way: it's quirky, but it is what it is. I mean all that whale detail is part of makes Moby Dick, Moby Dick. I've been taking the US Army approach to it — embrace the suck.

I've actually enjoyed a lot of details. I mean I know nothing a out the mechanics of whaling, so I found that part fascinating. As near as I can figure it's like sport fishing only on a titanic scale. When a fish gets hooked, he gonna run. When fishing for rainbows with 4 lb test my thumb is the drag on the line. When fishing for halibut with a conventional Penn reel there's a star gear on the side that adjusts the drag on the line. You hook a big one, he gonna run, and you gonna need to crank down on the drag or that fish gonna run you out of line in no time. Extrapolate that to whale size and you get a sense for what the whalers were dealing with. On one of the chases Stubb was paying out the line (Manilla rope for a whale) and his hands wound up acting as the drag. Ouch!

There are so many details in the book that if I find myself wondering if such-and-such will be covered, and the book never disappoints. A while back I wondered if Ismael would ever get around to doing a phrenological analysis of a whale, and there it was. Then a few posts ago I wondered if the Pequod would ever come across an British ship, and here it is. An Arm and a Leg chapter. Talk about juxtaposition! It's almost as though this chapter was workshopped in some writer's program in middle America. Ahab lost a leg to Moby. The English captain, Boomer, lost an arm to Moby. Ahab vowed revenge. Boomer chalked it up to a lesson well learned. It goes on and on.

It made me wonder if Hemingway got his idea for Jake Barnes from Ahab. Jake lost a pretty important part of himself in WWI. But Jake dealt with it differently.

Danik 2016

12-07-2023, 06:49 AM

Moby Dick isn´t just a book. It´s a particular world with it´s particular laws and you can be almost swallowed by it. Or not. You can put an cautious toe into it and say: "Heck, this is not for it."
I have two southsee novels by Melwille, "Omoo" and "Typhee" (hope the spelling is correct). They didn´t held me.
But "Moby Dick" is a saga that IMO goes far beyond itself.

hellsapoppin

12-07-2023, 10:32 AM

http://www.mobydick-hermanmelville.com/Moby_Dick/pictures_moby_dick/Starbuck_MobyDick1956Film.jpg

Starbuck ~ first mate. Second in command. Big character foil to Captain Ahab. Pragmatist. Ishmael tells us he is a Quaker and native of Nantucket. He had lost his father and brother at sea. Devout but superstitious. Possessed of "sobriety and fortitude". Very cautious. "I am here to kill whales, not to be killed by them."

Earlier we met Bildad and Peleg (retired mariners) who were the Quaker owners of the Pequod. Both were tyrannical and materialistic. They abused and overworked their crew members. Starbuck spoke softly to his crew members and was restrained in dealing with them. Ahab was demanding (he compelled his men to pledge their very lives in serving him in his quest to kill the whale), unwise, like the biblical tyrants he was equated with in the book, refused to listen to wise counsel - this to his doom. He did not subscribe to any particular religion but may have been influenced by a Far Eastern cult. Starbuck faithfully adhered to Christian influence. "Revenge not yourself. I will repay saith the Lord." [Romans 12:19] He is only 30 years of age but is highly experienced, widely traveled, and is a highly capable sea master. He steadfastly and honorably clings to the mission's aim which was to secure oil for the stock owners of the Pequod and to secure a decent profit.

Starbuck continually argues against Ahab's evil obsession in searching for the whale in order to kill him. At some point he considers mutiny and in killing his errant Captain. But he either lacks the courage or is morally hampered by his religion. Eventually he succumbs to Ahab's controlling "coerced will" [p 175]. When they disembark and go into the water to fight the sea creatures he demonstrates good seamanship [p 183] as he was "by far the most careful and prudent" commander.

In an exchange with another vessel he delivers a dead letter which presages doom [p 252]. Starbuck vainly tries to keep Ahab mindful of the vessel's leakage (which is damaging the vessel and causing a loss of revenue) but the one track minded Captain dismisses all such talk [p 362]. "There is one God that is Lord over the earth, and one Captain that is lord of the Pequod - on deck". [p 363] So much haughtiness while Starbuck remains ever so humble.

When caught in a typhoon Starbuck notes that the wind is driving from the east. That this could be a ready means of getting back home in order to secure safety for all. Ahab will have none of it which spells doom for Starbuck. Then he says "if thou are a brave man thou wilt hold they peace" rather than argue with the obstinate and crazed captain. [p 382]

He sees St Elmo's Fire [p 383] and warns that this is an ill omen. He gives more warnings to Ahab but is ignored. He engages in a 'doom and gloom' soliloquy as he muses whether he should kill the captain, knowing that the latter would kill him and the entire crew. "Would I be a murderer?" if he followed through on his thoughts.

He gives more warnings in vain. And you know the rest ...

"Oh Captain, my Captain" ~ I guess this is where Whitman gleaned these words.

Starbuck represents Christian deference, morality, rationality, humility, and stoicism in the face of this evil, chaotic world, and violent world. Had his wise counsel been adhered to all would have been turned out well = the men would live, the vessel returned home in one piece, its stockholders would have gotten oil profit revenues, and perhaps there could have been more profitable voyages in the future for the crew members, Captains, officers, and the vessel. Ahab's evil refusal to adhere to his wisdom caused the disaster that befell everyone. Thankfully one sailor survived to give us the narrative and, hopefully, we will all learn valuable life lessons from his fate.

hellsapoppin

12-07-2023, 10:49 AM

The real life inspiration for Moby Dick:

https://www.kuloluna.com/Books_Kulo_Luna_Kindle_Paper_Hardbacks_Chapters/Pictures_Books_KuloLuna/mocha-dick-jeremiah-reynolds-white-whale-pacific-magazine-knickerboker.jpg

https://www.kuloluna.com/Books_Kulo_Luna_Kindle_Paper_Hardbacks_Chapters/Mocha_Dick_Giant_White_Sperm_Whale_Largest_In_The_ World_Jeremiah_Reynolds_Sinks_20_Whaling_Ships.htm l

The greatest whale of them all was an albino male first spotted by man close off Mocha Island. Unlike the whale that sunk the Essex, this one displayed behaviour so inexplicable in terms of ethology that, to this day, no academic has ever attempted an explanation. This sperm whale had, not one point of human observation, but data from more than a hundred encounters, each with multiple witnesses. Though scholars might have placed this animal in the ‘too hard’ basket, the same cannot be said of the nineteenth century whalers and general public.

Such was his status that it was said that when whaling vessels rounding the Horn in the 1830s, sailors exchanged stories and updates of little else. One bestselling book was written about him.

In the nineteenth century, whaling ships didn’t attack their prey directly, but sent out smaller boats with harpooners. Thus a moderately clever whale who had seen it all before would be able to distinguish whalers from other ships, and to recognise when they were on the hunt. Mocha Dick must have at least made that association, as it was these longboats that he habitually joined as they made their way towards pods of females.

Mocha’s approach is often described as in the manner of a friend, whose only sin was to try to maneuver them away from their work. In general, it seemed that he would only attack if they tried to harpoon the great whale himself, to which purpose he was always very careful to expose only the least vulnerable parts of his body (especially his tail) to their weapons. If attacked in person, he would then proceed to splinter their longboats with his powerful flukes. Most whalers knew better, with at least 80% of encounters running without incident.

Sancho

12-07-2023, 05:04 PM

All good stuff above, guys! Thanks bounty, Danik, hellsapoppin! So we've got Starbuck and Mocha Dick. When are we going to come across somebody named Cappuccino? I know, I know. That was low hanging fruit.

One thing I'm continually struck with while reading this book (my kindle says I'm at 83%) is how many things are covered in these pages. I'm also struck by the many levels a reader can find in this book. As with all good art, it can mean many things to many people. We can speculate about what Melville intended, or we can sort of let the words wash over us and find meaning where we can.

I suspect a devout religious person will find deep spirituality in Moby, whereas a strict secularist will find an secular message. Practicing Quakers of the day probably found much to admire in Captain Bildad while an Adam Smith capitalist probably found Captain Peleg more to his liking. Similarly a follower of Islam probably gravitated towards Fedallah. Someone who has read Darwin will find much in this book just as someone who takes Genesis literally. An Earth-First conservationist will find just as much in this book as will a Drill-Baby-Drill type. A biologist will find biology, a mycologist will find mycology, an astronomer will find astronomy, an astrologer will find astrology. And of El Sancho of the Litnet will find a connection to the Panza of the Iberian Peninsula.

At any rate Moby cuts a wide swath, or carves a deep wake, as the case may be. Don Quixote is such a book. The Sun Also Rises is such a book. I only just speculated that Ahab may have been the inspiration for Jake Barnes. Then I read this and now I'm sure:

For it had not been very long prior to the Pequod’s sailing from Nantucket, that he had been found one night lying prone upon the ground, and insensible; by some unknown, and seemingly inexplicable, unimaginable casualty, his ivory limb having been so violently displaced, that it had stake-wise smitten, and all but pierced his groin; nor was it without extreme difficulty that the agonizing wound was entirely cured.

Bummer of an injury, Ahab.

hellsapoppin

12-07-2023, 05:21 PM

"To be or not to be" cf. ""Would I be a murderer"

Hamlet and Starbuck are two characters who suffered a similar fate. Both had been wronged. A higher authority usurped control over their lives and families. Those usurpers abused their authority and posed a great threat to them. Hamlet wanted to go back to Wittenberg. Starbuck wanted to go back home to his family. Both were stopped in their quest for peace. What then were they to do?

In Shakespeare's Hamlet the protagonist muses about suicide over ''Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer. The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles ..."

In Moby Dick, instead of suicide, Starbuck muses about killing Ahab as a means of avoiding a sea of troubles.

Hamlet also thought about killing King Claudius in revenge for the wrong that had been done to the Prince. But he sees the old man at prayer (seemingly in a state of repentance) and thinks better about it.

Starbuck thought about killing a sleeping Ahab but withdrew as did Hamlet. He asks, "Great God where art thou?"

Neither followed through with their musings and both were ultimately killed as a consequence of their inaction. The Bible promises "I will repay saith the Lord." But this Lord failed to do so for both characters.

hellsapoppin

12-07-2023, 05:44 PM

~ Fedallah ~ quoting Sancho, "a follower of Islam probably gravitated towards Fedallah"

"Spiritual" adviser to Ahab which may be hard to believe considering how abusive and blood thirsty he is. But Fedellah would not likely be a favorite among Orthodox Muslims as he is a Parsee, or a member of an orthodox Indian branch of Zoroastrianism. The Parsee wears a turbin which is a pagan headdress. Thus, while tolerated, members of this religion are not recognized as "People of the Book".

Sancho

12-07-2023, 10:39 PM

Oy vey. Wrong religion. Ah well, my main point was that art means different things to different people. I don’t think you can say definitively it means this one thing but not the other. So the same passage can give an optimist hope while giving a pessimist apprehension.

Anyway, talk about serendipity. I made that post while boarding an airplane. Then I sat down in my seat (a middle seat in coach on a packed airplane) and started reading about the Pequod sailing into a Pacific typhoon. My seat mate looked over my shoulder and said, “Hey, you’re reading Moby Dick. I love that book. I just reread it last year.” I told him I’d read it years ago too but was probably too young to get much out it. He said he had the same experience. I didn’t mean to put him on the spot, but I wanted to know, so I asked what it was about the book that he liked so much. He hemmed and hawed a little bit then said, “Well, I’m a merchant marine. I liked the sailor stuff.”

Sancho

12-07-2023, 10:49 PM

Again, talk about serendipity. I just read the scene where Starbuck contemplates murder/mutiny. And I agree, it has a Shakesphere feel about it — with a maritime twist. Starbuck goes through a whole pro vs con reasoning process: where’s the closest port (in Japan as it turns out); how to go about restraining Ahab if needs be; how would the crew reactn etc. It was a solid, methodical process. Whether or not he came up with the right answer, well, that remains to be seen.

hellsapoppin

12-08-2023, 01:03 AM

quoting Sancho,

~ “Well, I’m a merchant marine. I liked the sailor stuff.” ~

My dad was a merchant marine for 20 years. He had so many stories to tell! I guess this is why I have always loved movies and books about the Seven Seas. Here's a few of my fave movies:

Yankee Clipper 1927 - Douglas Fairbanks
Mutiny On the Bounty 1935 - Charles Laughton (my dad's fave actor)
Captain Blood 1935 - Errol Flynn
The Sea Hawk 1940 - Errol Flynn
The Sea Wolf 1941 - Edward G Robinson
Treasure Island 1950 - Robert Newton
Captain Horatio Hornblower 1951 - Gregory Peck
Moby Dick 1956 - Gregory Peck
The Gallant Hours 1960 - Jimmy Cagney

There were probably about a dozen more but just cannot remember them off hand. And as for sea faring stories, well there are just too many to list.

Danik 2016

12-08-2023, 09:50 AM

I simply love how ample this interchange is getting Sancho and poppin. One theme that called my attention and that seems so very current, is this mad insistence in a self-destructive war, started out of revenge or simply out of greed for more territory.

As for the comparison between Starbuck and Hamlet: as poppin points out they are both prey to their inactivity (and their scruples) but it seems to me that the position of both is a bit different.

Hamlet is the crown prince of his country. As such even not being king yet he has the possibility to get allies outside Denmark. Maybe what hampers him most is not the uncle, but having to go against his own mother. Anyway his inactivity causes the extermination of the ruling
dynasty and lays the country open to foreign domain.

Starbuck's position though much more modest is, in a sense, much more difficult. He is trapped on a ship with a mad captain, being he himself the direct subordinate of that captain. He can´t afford to fail. One faulty step in bringing the whole crew on his side and he will be tried for treason. I think Starbuck is a nice guy who is not used to lawlessness. And maybe that´s his biggest difficulty. He doesn´t know how to deal with it without dirtying his hands.

hellsapoppin

12-08-2023, 12:19 PM

@Danik

Very glad to see you are enjoying the exchange here.

Your post inspired to check into the equation between Hamlet and Starbuck. I came up with this:

According to Melville biographer Leon Howard, "Ahab is a Shakespearean tragic hero, created according to the Coleridgean formula." The creation of Ahab, who apparently does not derive from any captain Melville sailed under, was heavily influenced by the observation in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's lecture on Hamlet that "one of Shakespeare's modes of creating characters is to conceive any one intellectual or moral faculty in morbid excess, and then to place himself ... thus mutilated or diseased, under given circumstances." Whenever Moby-Dick's narrator comments on Captain Ahab as an artistic creation, the language of Coleridge's lecture appears: "at all detract from him, dramatically regarded, if either by birth or other circumstances, he have what seems a half-wilful over-ruling morbidness at the bottom of his nature." All men "tragically great," Ishmael says, "are made so through a certain morbidness." All mortal greatness "is but disease."

Ahab's speech combines Quaker archaism with Shakespeare's idiom to serve as "a homegrown analogue to blank verse.

from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Ahab

I was not aware that Ahab was so much like these other characters as shown in the wiki link.

In Shakespeare, Claudius was King while Hamlet was Prince as you say. In Melville, Ahab (based on a biblical king per 1 Kings 16:29) ruled his own vessel as if he was a king with Starbuck second in command like a prince. Thus, the equation between Shakespeare & Melville along with the equation of Hamlet and Starbuck turned out to be quite appropriate.

Online article about biblical king Ahab:

https://www.christianity.com/wiki/people/who-is-king-ahab-in-the-bible.html

He worshiped a pagan god, committed many evils, refused to heed wise counsel, and his actions led to the deaths of many. Captain Ahab was a cultist, committed many evils, also refused wise counsel, and his actions led to the deaths of his crew.

Very interesting set of characters throughout the book.

Sancho

12-08-2023, 12:53 PM

Concerning current affairs, I was thinking sort of the same thing, Danik. I couldn’t help but to compare the whaling industry to the war in Gaza. Specifically two ethical principles: proportionality and proximity. (How’s that for alliteration?) The proximity of antagonists in both cases does not pose an ethical problem. Israelis clearly face a threat from Hamas and the whalers clearly put themselves in harm’s way by virtue of proximity to a big dangerous animal. But the proportionality principle is problematic. The Israeli response is quite heavy handed and although Ishmael makes a defense of whaling with respect to over-fishing allegations, his reasoning is somewhat flawed. He compares whaling to buffalo hunting on the North American Great Plains. The American Bison was practically exterminated in very short period of time around about the same time of Melville’s book. Ismael claims the same could not happen the the whales for a number of reasons. And in retrospect, Ismael was simply wrong. We of course have the benefit of hind sight. Ismael did not foresee the industrialization of whaling. And with ever bigger, more powerful ships as well as whaling gear like exploding harpoons, proximity is now the ethical principle that is also violated.

So I finished the book last night. Melville gave us two perfect bookends:

Call me Ishmael…And the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago.

I’m in the process going back through sections of the book and reading analysis and reviews. Thanks for links, hellsapoppin. Ahab certainly does seem like Shakespearian character, as does Starbuck. I don’t know if this comes up in the criticism, but doesn’t Mr Kurtz have a little Ahab in him?

Danik 2016

12-08-2023, 11:38 PM

Danik 2016

12-08-2023, 11:56 PM

Congratulations for finishing the book, Sancho! You are a very quick reader!
I fully agree to your analysis of the Gaza conflict and how it compares with this exaggerated whaling expedition. Ishmael defends it because it is his living.

I think Kurtz is also crazy but for another reason. If I rightly remember he has lost the touch, or almost, with civilization.

Sancho

12-09-2023, 03:24 PM

Bah, I just happened to have some dead time sitting on an airplane. Once I sort of tuned into Ishmael’s language it actually went fairly quickly. The language I found fascinating. It’s a mash-up of 19th century American English with a bunch of Nantucket/sailor/Quaker-isms tossed in. My wife is getting pretty sick of it — “Avast, woman! Hast thou a supper yet made?” (That was Sancho to Sancho’s Old Lady last night. I wound up fixing myself a PB&J)

At any rate, Stubb was a lot of fun to read, especially when he was on the chase, urging the rowers on:

Why don’t you snap your oars, you rascals? Bite something, you dogs! So, so, so, then:— softly, softly! That’s it — that’s it! long and strong. Give way there, give way! The devil fetch ye, ye ragamuffin rapscallions; ye are all asleep. Stop snoring, ye sleepers, and pull. Pull, will ye? pull, can’t ye? pull, won’t ye? Why in the name of gudgeons and ginger-cakes don’t ye pull?— pull and break something! pull, and start your eyes out! Here,” whipping out the sharp knife from his girdle; “every mother’s son of ye draw his knife, and pull with the blade between his teeth. That’s it — that’s it. Now ye do something; that looks like it, my steel-bits. Start her — start her, my silverspoons! Start her, marling-spikes!”

Here’s Starbuck and his crew on the same chase:

“Pull, pull, my good boys,” said Starbuck, in the lowest possible but intensest concentrated whisper to his men; while the sharp fixed glance from his eyes darted straight ahead of the bow, almost seemed as two visible needles in two unerring binnacle compasses. He did not say much to his crew, though, nor did his crew say anything to him. Only the silence of the boat was at intervals startlingly pierced by one of his peculiar whispers, now harsh with command, now soft with entreaty.

And here’s Ahab on the same chase:

But what it was that inscrutable Ahab said to that tiger-yellow crew of his — these were words best omitted here; for you live under the blessed light of the evangelical land.

It pretty much sums up their personalities.

Danik 2016

12-09-2023, 10:26 PM

Lol! Poor Mrs. Sancho! Good point about the language as descriptive of the main characters.

One thing I forgot about Moby is also how much humor it contained. The opening chapters when Ishmael meets Quequeg are absolutely hilarious.

hellsapoppin

12-10-2023, 12:44 AM

Over the years many commentators have speculated as to whether Melville was a homosexual. Among these writers were Hart Crane, WH Auden, EM Forster, and Virginia Woolf. Biographers have said that he had a "longing" for Hawthorne as shown in the letters they exchanged with each other. The longing was, of course, never reciprocated. Melville spent much time at sea in a business known as a refuge for those same sex inclined. And other letters he wrote (according to biographers) included some rather unguarded moments. For us as moderns, this is no big deal. In fact it is inconsequential. But in the past, it was so.

In 1996, a Texas public school district challenged Moby-Dick for violating its community ideals. This difficulty with the novel arose when “parents complained that the book went against family values,” so it was shunned from the classroom for a few months, although it was never actually banned (Jarvis 80). Although these values were never clearly defined, literary critics believe that a “controversial topic in Moby-Dick scholarship has been the novel’s homoeroticism,” or the underlying themes of same-sex desire and symbolic gender roles ...

https://www.ipl.org/essay/The-Importance-Of-Homoeroticism-In-Moby-Dick-F3ALM7HESCF6

Several nonfiction writers have also speculated as to Melville's sexual inclinations. See,

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/historys-dick-jokes-on-melville-and-hawthorne/

Many modern readers of the book also speculate on this. See,

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9991956

While we will never know the full truth about this, we can readily conclude that there are homoerotic elements throughout MD. The first being the "marriage" between Quee & Ish previously discussed. This unity was repeated when Ish says they "were wedded" on p 253 of the monkey rope episode. There was a certain "squeeze of the hand" on Ch 94 ~ let us all squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness". Chapter 95 deals exclusively with the whale's sexual appendage called its “grandissimus”:

https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/moby-dick-the-cassock

It is transformed into garments which qualify one for the office of "archbishoprick".

In the Cabin Table episode we saw where the harpooners made sport of Dough Boy. That because of it, he had to check for teeth marks on his arm. Perhaps this may suggest that there had been some form of sexual abuse of that victim. There may be other instances which are same sex sexually suggestive as well. This may be one of the reasons why the book was so obscure well into the 20th century.

more:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/jul/30/subversive-queer-and-terrifyrickingly-relevant-six-reasons-why-moby-dick-is-the-novel-for-our-times

Sancho

12-10-2023, 03:46 PM

Who knows? I’m sure it’s a possibility. A lot if the homoerotic stuff in the book could be read that way. And it's easy for a reader to think Ishmael is Melville, but that is a very slippery slope. Writers of fiction are a very slippery lot. I mean they write fiction after all. As for Ishmael, I kept trying to fit his relationship with Queequeg into one of Aristotle’s definitions of friendship. Reduced to an absurd level, the categories are friendships of: Utility, Pleasure, and Virtue. It kinda/sorta works, but not really — their friendship seemed to meander around a bit in those categories. They both seemed to be concerned about what was best for the other, for the other's sake (Virtue), but they also simply enjoyed hanging out with each other (Pleasure).

The Mat Maker chapter was interesting from a friendship point of view. As usual Ishmael goes into a detailed explanation of how to make a mat — the loom, the warp, the weft, the shuttle, etc. Anyway Ishmael is being very meticulous about his part of the operation — stringing the loom, pulling the weft through — but Queequeg is sort of halfassing it. His job is to pound the weave tight with the shuttle, for which he's using his lance. It's pretty funny. I pictured an old married couple stringing popcorn to trim out their Christmas tree, the wife enthralled, the husband distracted.

At any rate, it seemed to me Ishmael had a friendship of virtue with Queequeg, but Queequeg had a friendship with everybody. Queequeg did not hesitate to put it on the line for Tashtego when he was sinking in the whale's head, and for that matter Queequeg put it on the line for a kid he didn't even know on the ferryboat from New Bedford to Nantucket. If you remember a kid gets knocked overboard into the frigid water and while everybody else is standing around wondering what to do, Queequeg strips down, dives in, and saves the day. He didn't even stop to consider his own welfare.

So anyway, based on what I just read (thanks for the links) about Melville and Hawthorne, it does sound a lot like Ishmael and Queequeg. But again. I donno. Could be. But I don't particularly want to try to psychoanalyze someone from beyond the grave. I'll leave the man's privacy to himself.

So I mentioned two types of friendship with respect to Ishmael and Queequeg, but I didn't mention the third — friendships of utility, which is generally an agreement between people where they more or less use each other. When the need is over, the friendship is over. Sailors are known for this sort of thing. I mean three years with no port calls is long time for a bunch of 20-something dudes. The pressure is going to build up and without relief of some sort, nobody will be able to think straight and the whaling endeavor will suffer. And let's face it, it takes an imagination that not everybody has to go out with Rosie. (Nope, I won't explain who Rosie is — for you live under the blessed light of the evangelical land)

bounty

12-10-2023, 07:23 PM

https://ftw.usatoday.com/2023/12/massive-whale-emerges-yards-from-shore-thrilling-beachgoers?utm_source=MSN&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=inline-related

hellsapoppin

12-10-2023, 10:41 PM

Those who have read the Wallace book know that this subject was very important to Melville.

In the opening Ish asks "who ain't a slave?" The entire human race is on the same boat in this regard. What follows is an academic analysis of this matter:

https://2012books.lardbucket.org/books/creating-literary-analysis/s09-07-student-sample-student-paper-a.html

the practice of whaling in Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick as a metaphor for and critique of African American slavery in the mid-nineteenth century ... Throughout the entirety of Melville’s novel, the business of whaling is used as an extended metaphor of slavery and the pursuit, capture, and killing of runaway slaves to help readers understand the brutal and unethical nature of the institution of slavery. The chasing of whales through the vast oceans is analogous to the chase of runaway slaves after they had escaped from their masters. The chase was about dehumanizing the hunted group; in this case: the whales or the slaves.

Throughout the book, blacks are dehumanized. Stubb kills a whale and then proceeds to harass Fleece who is an aged black man [see Stubb's Supper episode]. Stubb also harasses Pip who is a dwarfish black for falling into the water and forcing another crew member to cut off a rope that would have brought in another whale [Castaway episode]:

https://www.childlitassn.org/assets/PresenterAbstracts18/G/Paige%20Gray.pdf

https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/m/mobydick/summary-and-analysis/chapter-93

He tells Pip that he could have sold the whale in the South and brought in more money than had he sold him for a slave. Terribly harsh words but it shows what little regard he had for blacks.

There are other forms of slavery such as Ahab's strangle hold on his crew, especially on Starbuck. But perhaps the strongest form of slavery is how we are all beholden to Fate. There are repeated references to Fate and determinism which enslaves us all. In Ch 1 Ish tells us Fate drew him to the ocean and the perilous voyage. He called Fate "the grand programme of Providence". In the Sermon, Father Mapple spoke of Jonah's inability to escape his fate. Quee depended on Yojo the amulet-god to help determine his fate. Elijah the "prophet" predicted Ish, Quee, and the vessel's fate. There many omens and prophecies are given, but the inevitable outcome (doom) simply cannot be avoided because these are preordained and we are all enslaved to this determinism.

hellsapoppin

12-11-2023, 03:16 PM

Again, talk about serendipity. I just read the scene where Starbuck contemplates murder/mutiny. And I agree, it has a Shakesphere feel about it — with a maritime twist ...

There's another Shakespeare parallel that I had forgotten about from The Tempest. In Act II the ship wrecked Trinculo says, "Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows". Indeed, Ish who had in utter misery found himself with a cannibal as a bedfellow in Quee. While he is terrified at first (he screams, "Coffin, angels, save me!"), he later learns that ''it is better to sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian." After all the initial trouble, he had a fine night's sleep. Thereafter he forges a brotherly relationship. At the book's end we see that Ish was saved from the shipwreck when he floated atop of Quee's coffin and was saved by the Rachel's crew members.

hellsapoppin

12-11-2023, 06:53 PM

There are a great many omens in MD each of which foretells doom. The early Extracts which open the book are menacing and give the reader plenty of warning that the events about to unfold are not pleasant. Ish rests at the Spouter Inn and it is managed by Peter Coffin. The Inn is dark and ominous. Within it is a withered old drug dealer who sells poisonous potions named Jonah. The Chapel in New Bedford has a front wall that features a listing of long dead mariners. There is much "death in this business of whaling". The sermon. The "prophet" Elijah. Even the name Pequod bespeaks of a doomed tribe and foretells of what is to come. St Elmos' Fire. There are a great many more omens all throughout the story. Failure to adhere to these warnings seals the unhappy fate of the characters.

My favorite of these came in the episode The Hat (ch 130). As we saw all throughout the book, Ahab, in a sense, proclaims himself a King (just like his biblical counterpart). A King wears his crown with pomp and great pride. And while he is, in a sense, a king, a law unto himself on the vessel and before his men, to Nature he is nothing more a pretender, a pompous usurper, and non entity. To Nature he is no greater than the lowest peasant or barbarian as all are equally subjected to its unforgiving laws. The vessel is now in an area where Moby Dick had been encountered previously. Ahab spends the entire day on deck vainly searching for signs of the beast. Suddenly, an eagle appears after several sea birds had been circling the vessel. A crew member alerts the captain to take care of his "crown" but is disregarded and the bird swipes Ahab's hat. "Ahab's hat was never restored" as the bird flew away with it, and dumps it onto the sea where it will never be recovered. This was surely a sign of things to come as the Law of Nature dictated that Ahab's mission and attempted usurpation of the ocean's mastery were without any actual basis or justification.

A lesson to be learned by all.

Sancho

12-11-2023, 08:55 PM

There’s a vividness and beauty to the scene where the bird steals Ahab’s hat:

“Your hat, your hat, sir!” suddenly cried the Sicilian seaman…

But already the sable wing was before the old man’s eyes; the long hooked bill at his head: with a scream, the black hawk darted away with his prize…

Ahab’s hat was never restored; the wild hawk flew on and on with it; far in advance of the prow: and at last disappeared; while from the point of that disappearance, a minute black spot was dimly discerned, falling from that vast height into the sea.

Also it’s kinda funny

Sancho

12-11-2023, 09:00 PM

As for the slavery theory — Uhh, I don't know, man. Might be a stretch. The dots don’t necessarily connect. Slavery was brutal. Whaling was brutal. That doesn’t make Moby Dick an extended metaphor about slavery any more than it makes Uncle Tom’s Cabin an extended metaphor about whaling. Both books were published around the same time, I’ll bet.

But hey, it’s art. If that’s how Alyce wants to read Moby, more power to her.

It was a fun exercise to compare whaling to slavery, but what also might be a fun exercise is comparing what Alyce saw to what Sancho saw in the same scene.

Stubb’s Meal:

Stubb kills the first whale of the voyage. By the time they get the whale back to Pequod and secured to the ship, it’s pretty late. Stubb wakes up Fleece the cook, an old black man, to prepare him a whale steak. It sounds like a tradition — a victory dinner. The whalers are pretty wound up and blowing off steam. Stubb starts jerking Fleece around, thinking he’s being funny. Fleece doesn’t think it’s funny. It’s an uncomfortable scene to read. At one point Stubb has Fleece “preach” to a bunch of sharks who are in a feeding frenzy around the whale carcass. Fleece’s speech is rendered phonetically in the text.

Alyce saw a language barrier between the whalers and the whale, and she compared it to the language barrier between the slaves and the slavers:

The communication barrier between the two allowed for hostility between the groups. Had the whales or the slaves been able to speak the same language as the whalemen or the white man, they may have been on more even playing fields and the group dynamics may have been less like predator and prey.

Sancho saw a power-distance relationship between Stubb and Fleece that was racist as hell but not necessarily a comment on slavery. What Sancho saw was more like Spider and Tommy in Goodfellas:

https://youtu.be/IDYKslnO0r0?si=b7s8hzPukSXXmHJr

Sancho

12-11-2023, 10:00 PM

Fast Fish Loose Fish

Alyce comments on this chapter too in her term paper about Moby as an extended metaphor for slavery.

In a nutshell, on the high seas at times a whale is harpooned but then escapes and he winds up dragging the harpoon and the line along with him until another whaler harpoons him. Sometimes two boats harpoon the same whale at more or less the same time. Ownership disputes over the whale inevitably arise and occasionally the parties wound up in court. So the law became none as “fast fish, loose fish.” If the line was secured to a boat, a fast fish, then the whale belonged to that crew. If the whale had escaped and was just dragging the line along, then he was free game.

Alyce makes a good comparison of the “fast fish loose fish” law and the runaway slave act. I’m just not sure that’s what Melville was thinking about when he wrote that chapter. In fact right there in the chapter he talks about one of the court cases where the attorney makes pretty awkward argument for the fast fish loose fish principle by comparing the whale to another oppressed group of people of the day:

Mr. Erskine was counsel for the defendants; Lord Ellenborough was the judge. In the course of the defence, the witty Erskine went on to illustrate his position, by alluding to a recent crim. con. case, wherein a gentleman, after in vain trying to bridle his wife’s viciousness, had at last abandoned her upon the seas of life; but in the course of years, repenting of that step, he instituted an action to recover possession of her. Erskine was on the other side; and he then supported it by saying, that though the gentleman had originally harpooned the lady, and had once had her fast, and only by reason of the great stress of her plunging viciousness, had at last abandoned her; yet abandon her he did, so that she became a loose-fish; and therefore when a subsequent gentleman re-harpooned her, the lady then became that subsequent gentleman’s property, along with whatever harpoon might have been found sticking in her.

Sancho

12-11-2023, 10:27 PM

I’m on a roll. Speaking of awkward moments, there’s The Castaway.

So Pip is the cabin boy. He’s probably 15 or so, a young black man, and is the youngest person on the crew. One of Stubb’s oarsmen gets injured and Pip gets drafted into his position. He’s never been that close to a whale and he is terrified. They get a harpoon into one whale and Pip is so scared that he jumps ship. Stubb reluctantly cuts the line and goes back to pick up him up. This is what he says to Pip:

“Stick to the boat, Pip, or by the Lord, I won’t pick you up if you jump; mind that. We can’t afford to lose whales by the likes of you; a whale would sell for thirty times what you would, Pip, in Alabama.”

I’m not sure if that comment or the lawyer’s harpooned lady is more awkward. But I don’t think it acts a metaphor for whaling as slavery. I think it’s Stubb and Pip living in the world they inhabit and Stubb, in the heat of the moment, using that (highly flawed) world to make a huge impression on Pip about the importance of staying in the boat.

But alas:

But we are all in the hands of the Gods; and Pip jumped again. It was under very similar circumstances to the first performance; but this time he did not breast out the line; and hence, when the whale started to run, Pip was left behind on the sea, like a hurried traveller’s trunk. Alas! Stubb was but too true to his word.

If there’s a metaphor here, I think it’s that capitalism is at odds with human virtue.

hellsapoppin

12-12-2023, 12:45 AM

''We can’t afford to lose whales by the likes of you; a whale would sell for thirty times what you would, Pip, in Alabama.”

Unrestrained capitalism as practiced in that era certainly is at odds with human virtue as you say. After all, "who ain't a slave?"
This telling remark in which Pip is demeaned and devalued clearly reveals how dehumanizing slavery is. Alyce Hockers is hardly alone in her beliefs that this was the symbolism intended by Melville. As previously mentioned this was part of Wallace's thesis in his book. In this he was joined by Alice Walker and many others. Numerous essays which seconds that view can be found all over the Internet. As another example, see:

https://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2301054.pdf

Still not convinced? OK. As with the Bible, everyone is free to interpret the book as they see it.

Sancho

12-12-2023, 01:38 PM

That single sentence, taken alone, without any other context does indeed sound brutal, dehumanizing, and all the other things that went along with the type of slavery being practiced in the American south at the time. But put into the context of the larger story, I think you’ll find Stubb is actually concerned with Pip’s welfare. Pip has already jumped from the boat once and Stubb had to cut a fast line and go back to rescue him. So now Stubb is in the Process of impressing upon Pip, in strongest possible terms, the need to stay in the boat.

In fact, after they’d fished Pip out of the water the first time, Stubb gave almost avuncular advice to Pip:

So soon as he recovered himself, the poor little negro was assailed by yells and execrations from the crew. Tranquilly permitting these irregular cursings to evaporate, Stubb then in a plain, business-like, but still half humorous manner, cursed Pip officially; and that done, unofficially gave him much wholesome advice. The substance was, Never jump from a boat, Pip, except — but all the rest was indefinite, as the soundest advice ever is. Now, in general, Stick to the boat, is your true motto in whaling; but cases will sometimes happen when Leap from the boat, is still better.

Then realizing he really needed to make the advice stick, Stubb goes on:

Moreover, as if perceiving at last that if he should give undiluted conscientious advice to Pip, he would be leaving him too wide a margin to jump in for the future; Stubb suddenly dropped all advice, and concluded with a peremptory command “Stick to the boat, Pip, or by the Lord, I won’t pick you up if you jump; mind that. We can’t afford to lose whales by the likes of you; a whale would sell for thirty times what you would, Pip, in Alabama. Bear that in mind, and don’t jump any more.” Hereby perhaps Stubb indirectly hinted, that though man loved his fellow, yet man is a money-making animal, which propensity too often interferes with his benevolence.

So there’s the context. Though related, the gist of the episode seems to be about the evils of money-making rather than the evils of slavery.

And as I pointed out above, as soon as they harpooned another whale, Pip jumped again. Stubb, true to his word, this time did not cut the line and return for Pip. However:

But had Stubb really abandoned the poor little negro to his fate? No; he did not mean to, at least. Because there were two boats in his wake, and he supposed, no doubt, that they would of course come up to Pip very quickly, and pick him up;

Well, that didn’t happen. The other two boats spied a pod of whales and changed directions and poor Pip wound up treading water for hours until the Pequod happened upon him and picked him up. It was a life-changing experience for Pip, and that figures into the rest of the story.

hellsapoppin

12-12-2023, 05:38 PM

In truth, I saw Typee as more fitting for this analysis as it is more of a socialist apologia. This because it seems to project a Marxist Utopian society. I'm not denying that the elements you list are not evident in MB (they certainly are). It's just that I see it as did the commentators I listed. But if that's the way you see it, fine. On the contrary, I always welcome divergent viewpoints.

hellsapoppin

12-12-2023, 09:49 PM

From the outset to the ending MB is filled with innumerable images of death. There are many words or symbols that bespeak of death all throughout the book. The story begins begins in early winter in November where Ish pauses before,

coffins
(at) rear of funeral processions
Cato throwing himself upon a sword
pistol and ball
mortal men

... and this is just page one! Scenes are described with these images:

ungraspable phantom of life
horror
hooded phantom
very dark and dismal
dreary street
gloom
darkness
tomb
blackness of darkness
dilapidated
burnt district
portentous
black mass
dark looking den
withered old man

... the next 400 pages or so contain a vast array of more such ominous images and wording. Then you finally reach the end where there's a happy ending for our hero Ish because he was buoyed by a coffin and because fate seemed to shut the mouths of the sharks.

Thus, DEATH is everywhere throughout the book though Fate spares Ish because of the brotherhood he forged with Quee. Death everywhere but Ish affirms life and that appears to be what he suggests for all.

hellsapoppin

12-13-2023, 02:09 AM

Up to now, it escaped my attention that we had numerous MD threads here on OL.C

One thing that almost all of these threads had in common is that they FAILED. Failed big time. Questions were asked about character motivations and most of those queries went unanswered. A thread starter would write "I need help regarding..." but, again, there would few or no replies. A common and recurring theme to the few replies was that the writer would attempt to interpret the book, character motivations, and themes using modern day sensibilities. This did not make a whole lot of sense to the OP's. As a consequence, most of those threads had zero replies or only a small handful. Then, they were closed without further activity.

By contrast, note how much activity has occurred in this thread. We have now had 8 pages of replies, original interpretive ideas, and divergent views on subjects, characters, and motivations. I believe we will have more such postings.

When I read a classical book such as those of Melville, Shakespeare, Twain, London, Dickens, or whomever, I do my best to get into the book as if the story was a real life part of my life - like I was a character within it. This is sort of like the Stanislavski school of acting where you not only portray a character, you actually live that character. Thus, if you are portraying Father Mapple, you must shout your sermon with the greatest passion possible - your eyes must become ablaze with passion, the sweat must pour from your head, and you must express great emotion when you speak. As a reader I was influenced by Professor Rene Wellek:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ren%C3%A9_Wellek

Professor Wellek and his scholarly disciples would dissect a book, chapter by chapter, page by page, paragraph by paragraph, even word by word. They would go back in time to learn a writer social milieu and read the book as if they were living in the past. They would not interpret the book as if they were moderns. Oh no, too much of the book's meaning would be lost if they did so. Evidently, the posters and OP's of those failed threads did so. They failed because they tried to impose their modern day sensibilities to this great book. By contrast, from the very beginning you saw how I recommended reading the Wallace book so that you would get inside the mind of Melville and his milieu. By doing so, now you would know what the book is really all about. Once you absorb all those meanings the book becomes of greater value to you.

People have asked, why should I read this books? What is so good about it?

Read Wallace and similar books. You will have all the answers thereby making this book far more enjoyable and reachable. This, I sincerely believe, is why this particular thread has succeeded while the others failed.

hellsapoppin

12-13-2023, 01:23 PM

Except for a few church attendants, Mrs Hussey the cook, Aunt Charity, and references to the mythic Andromeda and a school of fish, there are no females in the world of MD. I wonder why (???).

True this is a tale of whaling but, heck, even Captain Bligh for all his evils was well noted for venturing his men to places where they could go "wenching".

All the good people, the bad, the gods, the Christian Saints, God, the Devil, and everything else is male.

Why???

Sancho

12-13-2023, 07:04 PM

So I’m on my second book after finishing Moby, but I’m still thinking about Moby, and I reckon that’s one sign of a good book — still trying to peel that onion.

Death certainly is omnipresent, especially in a book where everybody dies except Ish and the fish. Here’s an early look at death on the Pequod.

One of the more enigmatic chapters is The Lee Shore. It’s only a “six-inch” chapter, but it seems to be about death, specifically the death of six-foot sailor, Bulkington.

Mary Anne Meechum : Hey Dad, why do you love me more than your other children?
Bull Meechum : Beat it, I'm reading the sports page.
Mary Anne Meechum : Let's have a conversation Dad. Let's bare our souls and get to know one another.
Bull Meechum : I don't want you to get to know me. I like being an enigma, like a Chink. Now scram.
— from The Great Santini

Bulkington is an enigma. We meet him early on in the book when a freshly landed crew stumbles into the Spouter Inn and starts whooping it up. Bulkington is more reserved than the others and steals away as soon as he can, perhaps so as not to be a wet blanket. But he is clearly beloved by his shipmates and as soon as they realize he’s gone, they start calling his name and stagger off after him.

The next time we see him he’s at the helm of the Pequod, and then Ismael launches into a philosophical discussion about the freedom of the sea, the comforts of the land, and the danger where two meet — the lee shore.

I initially pictured the lee shore as the downwind side of an island. The windward side of an island faces the prevailing winds. So big waves crash on the windward side and storms batter the the windward side. The leeward side is sheltered from the wind and the weather. Think of Hilo (windward) and Kona (leeward) on the big island of Hawaii. While Hilo’s getting hammered, tourists are golfing in Kona. For an aviator, like the great Santini, the lee side of a hill is were all the bad stuff happens. If he were to do a low-level ridge crossing in his F-8 he’d do it from the windward side. The wind gently pushes up and over the ridge and then it slams down on the lee side of the ridge. Trying to cross a ridge from the lee side (into the wind) he’d run the risk of getting mashed into the ground and tying the low-altitude record, as they say. So this was all very confusing to me because Ishmael kept describing the waves crashing into the lee shore and the wind pushing the ship onto the rocks on the lee shore. AH-HAH! The lee shore, to a sailor, is the shore on the lee side of the ship, hence it’s the windward shore. Well, that was harder than it needed to be.

Anyway here’s Bulkington steering the ship close to the lee shore. Ismael says:

…deep memories yield no epitaphs; this six-inch chapter is the stoneless grave of Bulkington.

And we see no more of Bulkington. The end of the page-long chapter goes like this:

Take heart, take heart, O Bulkington! Bear thee grimly, demigod! Up from the spray of thy ocean-perishing — straight up, leaps thy apotheosis!

But of course the Pequod never ran ashore. As best I can figure, Bulkington is an idealized version of Ismael and the Lee Shore kills off that part of Ishmael. Both are somewhat aloof. Both need to go to sea. Ishmael has to get out of Manhattan and Bulkington has to sail away again only three days after he returns from a long voyage. And with Bulkington out of the picture, Ahab can officially get on with his quest.

bounty

12-14-2023, 11:13 AM

remember how I had said "remind me when you get to chapter 128?"

the captain of the Rachel was a fellow named "gardiner." one of my dear friends from undergrad days was from Nantucket, and her last name is gardner. its a historical name on the island.

there is also a relatively famous island that is a part of ny state, but is actually privately owned, "gardiner's island" off the east coast of long island.

one wonders the connection between Melville's character(s), and those real life things.

off in a different direction, I posted this on another thread, its worth sharing here in hopes of more people seeing it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXCAAZ8_fCM

hellsapoppin

12-14-2023, 11:52 AM

Queequeg is the enabler in this tale. Without him, we would not have a narrator. He is Ishmael's facilitator throughout and his sacrifice is what allows him to survive. In the end, Ishmael's hopeful message to the word came to us through the medium of Queequeg. Here are a few ways in his he has been portrayed over the years:

Hollywood:

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRXfn57aqYxnygL_FJkkhlsyMr7KEpTt HIqGg&usqp=CAU

http://www.mobydick-hermanmelville.com/Moby_Dick/pictures_moby_dick/queequeg-canibal-harpooneer-moby-dick.jpg

Queegueg and Ishmael:

http://www.mobydick-hermanmelville.com/Moby_Dick/pictures_moby_dick/Queequeg-Ishmael-Moby-Dick1956-Warner-Brothers-Movie.jpg

In modern day renditions, they are portrayed just a bit closer together:

https://classicrants.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/mobydick_queequegxishmael.jpg?w=640

and he is a tad more menacing:

https://themelvillefiles.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/qq.gif

Sancho

12-14-2023, 11:21 PM

You know who’d make a great Queequeg? — Duane Johnson.

Bounty, Chapter 128 seemed fairly straight forward to me. The Pequod is in hot pursuit of Moby and comes across the Rachel, another Nantucket whaling ship. The captain of the Rachel boards the Pequod and beseeches Ahab to help search for a lost boat of his, which it turns out has his young son aboard. The Rachel’s captain says he won’t leave the Pequod until he gets a firm yes from Ahab to help in the search. Well, we all know Ahab by now, so is there any doubt in anybody’s mind what Ahab’s answer will be? — It was a flat no.

There was never any doubt in my mind what Ahab’s answer would be, or for that matter which captain’s will would prevail. So I kept asking myself what’s the purpose of this chapter? One thing we learn from the Rachel’s captain is that Ahab has a young son back in Nantucket. You see, the two of them know each other.

The very next chapter, The Cabin, is short and strange. Ahab and Pip are in the cabin. Ahab makes a move to leave and go topside, but Pip grabs his hand and tries to go with him. Ahab will have nothing of it and tells Pip to stay in the cabin. There’s an acknowledgment by both of them that they’re both crazy — Pip lost his marbles when he jumped from the boat and Stubb left him to drown. Ahab of course hasn’t been right since Moby bit off his leg. — Pip seems to think they can each fill the gaps in the other, and in fact it’s the only shot either of them have at sanity. Ahab agrees, but Ahab doesn’t want to be cured.

Ahab — “There is that in thee, poor lad, which I feel too curing to my malady. Like cures like; and for this hunt, my malady becomes my most desired health.”

Pip — “No, no, no! ye have not a whole body, sir; do ye but use poor me for your one lost leg; only tread upon me, sir; I ask no more, so I remain a part of ye.”

Ahab — “…but methinks like-cures-like applies to him too; he grows so sane again.”

Pip — “They tell me, sir, that Stubb did once desert poor little Pip, whose drowned bones now show white, for all the blackness of his living skin. But I will never desert ye, sir, as Stubb did him. Sir, I must go with ye.”

Ahab — “If thou speakest thus to me much more, Ahab’s purpose keels up in him. I tell thee no; it cannot be.”

And their fate is sealed.

We do see the Rachel again. After the big chase, and after everybody except Ishmael is on the bottom of the sea, the Rachel picks up Ishmael. The Rachel was still searching for their lost boat. So I wondered if Melville threw the Rachel chapter into the story for the sole purpose of making Ismael’s rescue plausible.

hellsapoppin

12-15-2023, 01:00 AM

Duane Johnson?

Not a bad choice at all, especially since he is half Pacific Islander.

Am a huge rugby fan and my choice would be the fierce Timoci Tavatavanawai who is Fijian:

https://fijisun.com.fj/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/01.jpg

hellsapoppin

12-15-2023, 02:52 AM

noble savage, in literature, an idealized concept of uncivilized man, who symbolizes the innate goodness of one not exposed to the corrupting influences of civilization

source: Google

There is so much more to discuss about this fascinating character. Clearly he falls within this category of noble savage. He definitely is a primitive, one given to impulsive behavior with a ready disposition to combat any perceived enemy. But he relents and treats familiars with respect and solicitude. He was at one time a prince among his people. But he renounced his heritage owing to a desire to familiarize himself with Christianity. His face is heavily tattooed which symbolize that he had been a cannibal in his early years. He sells shrunken human heads which make you wonder how he procured them ~ by any chance, did he croak those bodies or could he have been a grave robber? We'll never know.

When he initially meets Ishmael, he nearly kills him. Then, just as quickly he engages in that Matelotage arrangement with Ish and pledges that he would die for him if need be. He is highly adept at using the harpoon and actually uses it to shave! The narration then goes on to show that even though he is a pagan, Quee has noble qualities. He consults an amulet for spiritual guidance and proceeds to have a Ramadan ~ a series of fasting days much like those which are done by devout Muslims. Ish observes that despite his ritualism, his pal Quee is a good man, one worthy of respect by all. Despite all the teaching of that era which believed that pagans were bad people, Ish quickly learns that Quee is good and worthy.

Quee saves the life of a bigot who mocked him - "We cannibals must help these Christians." But he never fully abandons his pagan ways by using others as his sofa and day bed in Ch XXI because it was ''convenient''. He serenely smokes his tomahawk pipe.

In Ch LXVI there is a massive shark massacre. Despite the danger Quee sticks his hand in but does fear getting it bit off. He shows even more fearlessness when he saves the life of Tashtego. Ultimately he gets sick and requests a coffin to be buried at sea. He recovers but paints the coffin with markings that appear to be like his many tattoos. Ultimately that coffin is what saves Ish's life thus proving that integration and religious tolerance is what enhances life.

Sancho

12-15-2023, 10:41 AM

I hate to think the only reason Duane Johnson popped into my head as an ideal casting choice for Quequeg is that he’s the only famous Pacific Islander I could think of. But he’s got the blood. He’s got the physique. He’s got the hairdoo. He’s already partially tatted up. And he seems like the kind of guy who’d help a brother out who’d fallen into the ocean while entombed in a whale’s head.

It’s an action chapter, which is a relief after a couple of chapters of Ismael’s musings, but there are some odd correlations made by Ismael between the harpooners and the medical profession:

And thus, through the courage and great skill in obstetrics of Queequeg, the deliverance, or rather, delivery of Tashtego, was successfully accomplished, in the teeth, too, of the most untoward and apparently hopeless impediments; which is a lesson by no means to be forgotten. Midwifery should be taught in the same course with fencing and boxing, riding and rowing.

Evidently Tashtego was delivered by C-section. At any rate, Ismael gives us no doubt that being born, or in Tashtego’s case re-born, is a bloody battle.

Earlier that day the harpooners were extracting the whale’s teeth:

Queequeg, Daggoo, and Tashtego, being all accomplished dentists, are set to drawing teeth.

(I’m new to the whole E-reader thing and I made a lot of highlights in this book, which makes cutting and pasting easy)

hellsapoppin

12-15-2023, 10:49 AM

Sancho,

Re Rachel

... So I kept asking myself what’s the purpose of this chapter?

We do see the Rachel again. After the big chase, and after everybody except Ishmael is on the bottom of the sea, the Rachel picks up Ishmael. The Rachel was still searching for their lost boat. So I wondered if Melville threw the Rachel chapter into the story for the sole purpose of making Ismael’s rescue plausible.

A very good note.

Throughout MD we see repeated references to religion, paganism, Christianity, and the Bible. In Judaism, despite its mythic patriarchal image, the religion actually gives much credit to historic matriarchs. Rachel was one of them. Despite being barren she ultimately gives birth to two sons who are the sires of two of the 12 tribes of Israel: Joseph and Benjamin. She had a maid and she arranged to have that maid become the mother of two other Israelite tribes. I have forgotten all the historical politics that her story dealt with but do recall that she was regarded as a savioress of children, including "lost" children or something like that, as well as a leading matriarch (she has been referred to as Mother Rachel) responsible for perpetuating the tribes. In the New Testament there was this blurb from Matt 2:18 ~

A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more

Which shows that she, indeed, had great concern for the children of the tribe because she was a loving mother.

Thus, no surprise that the marooned Ishmael was rescued by the Rachel.

hellsapoppin

12-15-2023, 04:11 PM

Pequod Meets the Samuel Enderby of London

Pequod meets the Samuel Enderby. Ahab is welcomed aboard by Captain Boomer. But Ahab had never been on another vessel since his unfortunate meeting with MD and has some difficulty in boarding. With some adjustments in the rigging he was able to board ship. Like Ahab, Boomer had had an unfortunate encounter with the White Whale. He lost an arm as a consequence. The arm was replaced with whale bone much like Ahab had done on his leg. However, the artificial limb was shaped like a weapon. While Ahab seethes in endless rage over MD's action and his fanatical desire for revenge, Boomer engages in much frivolity over it. He and his medic Dr Bunger (perhaps a play on the word bungler??) share a series of laughs over the encounter and how the doc's fruitless efforts panned out. Both drank hot toddies (rum drinks) to drown out the pain and the mis-emotion over the loss of the limb. Bunger says Boomer does go into fits and starts every once in a while. In fact, Boomer put a dent in his head though the latter denied it.

http://www.mobydick-hermanmelville.com/Moby_Dick/pictures_moby_dick/Boomer_Captain_James_Robertson_Justice.jpg
Cᴀᴘᴛᴀɪɴ Bᴏᴏᴍᴇʀ

Ahab demands to know what direction was MD headed and also demands to know why Boomer has not pursued him. Boomer asks, 'isn't losing one arm enough?" He has reconciled himself to his unhappy fate and knows that the whale was only doing what it needed to do as self preservation. Boomer gives him the proper direction and concludes that Ahab was sick with madness as he proceeds to his destiny.

He was so right.

hellsapoppin

12-15-2023, 04:56 PM

when ya goin' to the baa, paak ya caa at Havad yaad
and give the guy a quata fo' a cup of clam chowdaa

Being originally from New York I always got a kick out of poking fun at the old Boston/Yankee accent. Hollywood has always had fun with this as well and even Saturday Night Live has had a couple of humorous skits about it. Sad to say, the old accent is disappearing and is now only visible outside of the immediate city area.* This because of all the gentrification that has taken place in recent years and because old Bostonians have been forced to move out.

Bostonians have always prided themselves on their Yankee chowder** as well as they should be because it is hearty and very tasty. I've made a few bowls of New England chowder over the years and even had my recipe for it presented on Yankee magazine when that website had a public forum (it does not exist anymore).

In MD it comes as no surprise that two exhausted travelers in Ishmael and Queequeg enter a food joint to partake of hearty and enlivening Yankee chowder. The hostess Mrs Hussey arranged for them to have two very tasty bowl of clam chowder which they ate with great despatch and much delight. Ish enjoyed it so much that he ordered cod bisque which, evidently, he enjoyed as well. The hostess told them she would have more for breakfast the next morning which Ish took as good news. For variety, he asked for some smoked herring in the breakfast meal.

Ah, I like Ish's taste ~ I love chowder, cod, and smoked herring. Mmm, mmm ...

Which reminds me that, sad, to say, folks here in Minnesota don't particularly like sea food. They can take fresh water fish but not ocean fish and the many varieties of sea food. I've had people here laughing at me for eating sea weed. In fact, one little girl saw me eating some and she almost puked! Ha, ha! The joke's on them --- I LOVE sea food just like Ishmael and Queequeg. :angel:

*this video has a perfect example of what I mean - note her Braintree accent. It's a thing of beauty as far as I'm concerned:
https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=b9D0r-YtwHQ
Please note that it contains language which may be deemed offensive to some and this is why I did not give the direct link.

**known as Boston, New England, or Yankee chowder ~ I call it Yankee chowder. For really good flavor, add grated parsnips, Romano cheese, and extra clams or chopped herring.

Sancho

12-15-2023, 08:15 PM

Ah yes, Rachel. Methinks Melville’s contemporaries would have immediately made that connection. I had to google her. Whenever an Old Testament name pops up in Moby, it’ll mean something. Given the reflexive anti-semitism of the day, I was mildly surprised to find that, as you pointed out, Rachel is someone who is mainly revered in the Jewish community. She didn’t seem to gain much traction in the Christian tradition. Nevertheless it would signal Melville’s readers that the purpose of The Rachel is to wander the sea (desert) looking for lost children.

BTW, I’m trying to resurrect “methinks” into our modern lingo. I like it. It’s useful and less clunky than “IMHO”. In fact just the other day I was in a restaurant and said to the waitress, “methinks I’ll have have the pancakes.” She smiled at me like I was a half-bright six-year-old and then wandered off towards the kitchen. The word kinda reminds me of a word my niece and nephew used a lot when they were little. “Lookit”

Niece — Hey, JT, lookit!
Nephew — I don’t wanna lookit. You lookit.
Niece (with exasperation) — Jaaay-Teee! Lookit, lookit, LOOKIT!
Sancho (with mild amusement and slight exasperation) — You know, niece, lookit is not a real word.
Niece (with severe exasperation) — Oh yes it is, Uncle Sancho! It’s like when I say to JT, (pointing at the object in question) Hey, JT, lookit this!
Sancho — You win, niece.
Side note, nephew stuck to his guns and never did look at what his sister wanted him to look at.

Arm and a Leg chapter was fun. It was vividly written. I almost felt like I could join in with the banter between Boomer and Bunger. Who hasn’t witnessed this sort of thing? It’s as though these guys are on stage, performing their schtick for an audience, even playing their audience a little bit. And then there is the moment when Boomer realizes Ahab is totally bonkers. He gives Fedallah a questioning look and Fedallah replies by simply putting his finger to his lips.

Sancho

12-17-2023, 12:34 AM

Chowdah! I just left Boston yesterday. I didn’t have the chowdah. But I did pick up a box of cannolis in the North End. The concierge saw them while we were getting on the van to go to the airport. — “Ya know, those cannolis theyah, they don’t allow ‘em outta tha zip code. You’ll have’ta leave’em hee-ah. I think he was from Southie.

So I’m still not convinced Melville intended Moby as an extended metaphor for slavery, but I wanted to expand my horizons, so I read his novella Benito Cereno. I was aware of it, but I hadn’t read before yesterday. It can easily be read on a 5 1/2 hour flight. Hellsapoppin, I’m sure you’ve read it, but for anybody else reading along with us I’ll give it a quick rundown:

Benito (Don) Cereno — Captain of the Spanish slave ship The San Dominick
Amasa Delano — Captain of the American sealing ship The Bachelor’s Delight
Babo — Leader of the slave uprising.
Atufal — Co-leader of the slave uprising, former African king
Alexandro Aranda — Slave owner

It’s 1799 and Captain Delano and his crew are anchored in the bay of a remote island off the coast of Chile, when a ship flying no flag and in poor condition limps into the bay. Delano takes a launch to the ship to offer assistance and investigate. The ship turns out to be a Spanish slave ship and Delano meets its sickly Captain, Benito Cereno, and his servant, Babo. There are only a few Spanish sailors on board, but there are many black slaves including men women and children. The ship’s in bad shape and they’re just about out of water and food. Delano sends his launch back to the Bachelor for food and supplies. Captain Cereno tells the American they had run into bad weather/seas around Cape Horn and also they’d had a scurvy outbreak that killed many.

During the back-and-forth between the two captains, the servant, Babo, never leaves Cereno’s side. Delano notices many odd things on the ship and probes Cereno for information, but the clue bird never lands. To the reader, the whole situation fairly screams of mutiny/uprising by the slaves, but Delano just doesn’t see it.

The launch comes back and supplies are unloaded. Captain Delano boards the launch for the return to the Bachelor. Just as the launch is pulling away, Captain Cereno leaps over the bulwarks onto the boat and Captain Delano finally realizes what has happened on the San Dominick. The crew of the Bachelor mount an incursion and the San Dominick is recaptured.

There’s an investigation and a trial in Lima and Babo is executed. (Atufal was killed as the San Dominick was retaken. Alexandro Aranda had been killed during the uprising)

What I liked about this story is how it pulls the reader into the narrative. It’s an adventure story with the curve of an adventure story. And it’s told from the perspective of Captain Delano. He is duped by Babo and Atufal, but when he realizes there’s been a brutal uprising and mutiny he knows he needs to right the wrong. And I’d imagine most readers go along with him until they realize — Hey! Wait a minute! It’s an effing slave ship. Those guys should be uprising! What the ef are you doing, Delano?

Anyway, the story is a fictionalized version of a real slave mutiny. The timeline was changed to coincide with the brutal slave uprising in Haiti. Captain Delano represents hypocritical northerners. Captain Cereno represents the slave-holding south. Methinks.

hellsapoppin

12-17-2023, 01:01 AM

^methinks you made two very good analytical comments there ~ much kudos to you

Sancho

12-17-2023, 10:56 AM

Hahaha. It’s catching on.
Thanks. Methinks Benito Cereno puts Melville firmly in the abolitionist camp.

hellsapoppin

12-18-2023, 01:45 PM

Not quite sure how to approach this subject but I'll give it a go:

We are often told that money is the root of all evil.

But first, let's go back to early in the book when Quaker Captain Bildad wants to keep Ishmael's earnings to a very bare minimum. He offers only 1/777th of a "lay" for his three year labors. He does this and says "where your treasure is, your heart is also" quoting Matt 6:21. Captain Peleg objected to this small sum, said that it was a "swindle", and ordered that he get 1/300th instead. Bildad claims that he was concerned about the stockholders of the ship and that they were entitled to a good return on their investment. Strange that he forgot that the rule about treasure applies to them and to him as well. This is all highly ironic because Quakers, though Christian (in theory) they were such slave drivers at sea. The non materialist Ish accepts the payment terms without objection.

Ch XCIX ~ the Doubloon

The gold piece is of great value - $16 in those days - and one such coin was shown to the crew members by Ahab. The coin was offered to the first one to spot the whale at sea. While his evil quest was certainly not motivated by money (he was motivated by hate and a yearning for revenge), he used the money as an incentive for the men to join with him in the madness inspired pursuit of the whale. All had a good view of the precious coin. Ahab was quite taken by its many inscription and symbols including the Zodiac. Starbuck sees the symbols as reflecting Death. The Old Manx believes it portends the time when the whale will be found. Queequeg and Fedallah have their own views on it as does Pip who makes several senseless mutterings. Ultimately he predicts that the money will be found within the vessel some day at the bottom of the sea. He was likely correct.

While it cannot be said that money is the actual cause of all the evil that befell everyone, there is no question that the doubloon did serve as incentive for the crew men to join with Ahab's evil and crazed intentions. Because of that, it led to their deaths. Thus, in a sense, it was the root of evil - the evil death of the vessel and the crew members.

bounty

12-18-2023, 07:01 PM

Not quite sure how to approach this subject but I'll give it a go:
We are often told that money is the root of all evil.

just a quick interjection poppin if it helps. its a common mistake, but the actual biblical phrase is that "for the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil..." 1 timothy 6:10.

hellsapoppin

12-18-2023, 10:26 PM

just a quick interjection poppin if it helps. its a common mistake, but the actual biblical phrase is that "for the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil..." 1 timothy 6:10.

It may do so though the Douay-Rheims Bible renders it,
For the desire of money is the root of all evils; which some coveting have erred from the faith, and have entangled themselves in many sorrows.

Desire? Need? We don't know if some of those crew men were impoverished or perhaps they weren't. Whatever the case, I'm sure Ahab knew it would serve as some incentive for the men to pledge their unending support for his evil quest.

Sancho

12-19-2023, 03:48 AM

So I’ve got this white whale of a rat living in my barn. He chews through feed bags. Poops in the horse trough. He climbed up into the engine of my truck, chewed up a bunch of insulation, made a nest under the intake manifold, and then…started chewing through wiring bundles. I’ve been trying to get that sucker for months now — catch and release traps, snap traps, glue traps, 5 gallon bucket traps, barn cat, fast dog — no luck. I even sealed up the barn tight and ran a gasoline generator in there for a couple of hours trying to gas him out. Nope. He’s unworldly. He’s a super rat.

I guess I didn’t find Ahab to be evil. Maybe a little obsessed, a bit of an autocrat, not a real people person, but hey it’s lonely at the top. I actually kind of liked the guy. He was a highly competent sailor and he was relatively up-front about his intentions with his crew, after a few days at sea anyway. As captains/colonels/bosses go, I’ve seen worse. Getting the men behind him by nailing the doubloon to the mast was brilliant. It made it that much harder for the mates to go against him. But then it was Ahab who spotted the whale first. It seems like half the crew is up on the yard arms looking for the whale. So here’s Ahab right after he called the spout:

“And did none of ye see it before?” cried Ahab, hailing the perched men all around him.

“I saw him almost that same instant, sir, that Captain Ahab did, and I cried out,” said Tashtego.
“Not the same instant; not the same — no, the doubloon is mine, Fate reserved the doubloon for me. I only; none of ye could have raised the White Whale first. There she blows!— there she blows!— there she blows! There again!— there again!”

I cringed a little there. I couldn’t believe Ahab was going to cut everybody out. The chase for the whale ensues but by the end of the day, Moby had skunked them. So with everybody back on the Pequod, Ahab rallies the troops:

— Aloft! come down!— Mr. Stubb, send a fresh hand to the fore-mast head, and see it manned till morning.”— Then advancing towards the doubloon in the main-mast —“Men, this gold is mine, for I earned it; but I shall let it abide here till the White Whale is dead; and then, whosoever of ye first raises him, upon the day he shall be killed, this gold is that man’s; and if on that day I shall again raise him, then, ten times its sum shall be divided among all of ye! Away now! the deck is thine, sir!”

Ahab was in it for vengeance not gold. Ismael wasn’t in it for gold either. He was in it for the adventure, and of course to prevent him from “deliberately stepping into the street and methodically knocking people’s hats off.” I was still a little disappointed, though, to see Ishmael let Peleg and Bildad take advantage of him like that. I expected more from a New Yorker.

The chapter where everybody walks by the coin that’s nailed to the mast and contemplates it, is interesting and as I was reading it, I remember thinking — I’ll bet professors of interpretive literature have a field day with this chapter.

So a day or two ago I was out in the barn, mucking out a stall, when I noticed one of the road apples I was shoveling into the wheelbarrow looked a little funny — Hey, that horse turd has hair! Hey, that’s no horse turd. That’s a semi-flat rat! Woo-Hoo! Wife’s horse must’ve stomped that sucker last night. Ahab should’ve been so lucky.

hellsapoppin

12-19-2023, 11:15 AM

^Post of the Year!

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Danik 2016

12-19-2023, 01:46 PM

Wonderfully told, Sancho! But don´t let bounty read that post, as the rescue of rat Ahab isn´t possible any more.

Sancho

12-19-2023, 02:49 PM

Haha. Thanks, guys.

Also I’ve been trying to figure out how to break it to bounty that my own amateur analysis of this book is — it’s one of the greats. It’s big, it’s brash, subtle at times, hilarious at times, and maddeningly wordy at others, but it’s one for the ages. Even the chapters that, on the surface, seem bogged down with minutia have meaning and purpose. The whole thing was fascinating to me. When I got to the end I found myself wishing there was more. That said, I don’t think it’s a good High School subject, or for that matter an Eng101 college subject. Springing this book on some poor, unsuspecting teen is cruel and probably detrimental to their future interest in literature.

bounty

12-19-2023, 04:02 PM

I can do a long distance mourning for the unfortunate rat...

I just recently relocated I think what was mouse #7 from my house.

its okay Sancho, im still confident in the good company, teenagers, college freshmen, and otherwise, who hate the gosh darn thing! smiles...

ive been wondering how zane grey's going for you andddddddd, since you mentioned an interest in moby continuing, I find myself wondering if you've ever read the bounty trilogy, of which, mutiny on the bounty is first.

hellsapoppin

12-20-2023, 01:24 AM

bounty,

I find myself wondering if you've ever read the bounty trilogy, of which, mutiny on the bounty is first.

Read Mutiny On the Bounty many moons ago. Was utterly fascinated by the story since I was a little kid, saw the movie, with Charles Laughton, and read the book some time in the late 1960s. Don't recall when precisely for sure.

From the beginning I felt Captain Bligh was innocent and that Mr Christian was the heel. For many years it was assumed by many that Bligh was a terrible dictator who was cruel to his men. Revisionist historians teach something quite different. That while he was disciplinarian, he was not as cruel as had been projected. He was cleared of cruelty charges and later appointed as a governor somewhere in the South Pacific where he lived out his life in prosperity.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/Charles_Laughton_in_Mutiny_on_the_Bounty_trailer.j pg

I'll see you in Hell, Mr Christian!

Sancho

12-20-2023, 02:17 AM

I smell varmint poontang! On the bright side, having a rat in the barn pretty much cleared the mice out of there.

I have not read Mutiny on the Bounty, but I have a copy of it around here somewhere. I was actually thinking of reading it now that I’m sort of tuned into the nautical lingo. I did read Herman Wouk’s Caine Mutiny not long ago. Most of the sea adventure/shipwreck books I’ve read are nonfiction: Into the Raging Sea by Rachel Slade, Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton, Icebound: Shipwrecked at the Edge of the World by Andrea Pitzer, Mighty Fitz: Sinking of the Edmond Fitzgerald by Michael Schumacher, Blue Latitudes by Tony Horwitz, Farthest North by Fridjof Nansen, The Perfect Storm, by Sebastian Junger, Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing, The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst by Nicholas Tomalin, In the Heart of the Sea and Sea of Glory by Nathaniel Philbrick, The Outlaw Sea by William Langewiesche. I sure I’m forgetting a few.

I’ll get back to Zane Grey soon.

bounty

12-20-2023, 05:27 PM

hellsapoppin

12-20-2023, 06:22 PM

i recently read poppin that the laughton version of the movie did either a disservice to the facts of the story, or the book, I cant remember which.

Sancho---if you wanna stay in a sea vein, and don't go the direction of mutiny on the bounty, lemme recommend to you, the sea wolf by jack London.

ive got bunches of the master and commander books, and horatio hornblower, and those have been enjoyable, but after mutiny, londons been my favorite.

... disservice ...

I do believe the Laughton movie did that to the book. In the actual story Captain Bligh stood up at trial for some personnel that he could not fit into the small launch that the mutineers gave him. The prosecution tried to convict them but they were innocent and released thanks to his testimony. In the movie he prosecuted those innocents who did not rebel.

... Sea Wolf ...

One of my fave sea stories. London also wrote short stories about Pacific Islanders. Very good reading.

James Michener's Alaska is largely a sea story. I especially was struck by the story of Captain Micheal Healy. Billy Budd, Treasure Island, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, The Narrative of Arthur Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe, Man Without A Country by EE Hale, etc. I'm sure there were other books I read of the sea but just cannot recall them at the moment.

hellsapoppin

12-20-2023, 06:50 PM

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c3/Tristanat_Boat_Show.jpg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tristan_Jones

I read Ice! and portions of a couple of other books but dismissed much of this as fiction. Jones was a self promoter who wrote highly embellished stories in which he claimed to be heroic. Fish stories abound in his work but they are mildly entertaining.

hellsapoppin

12-21-2023, 01:35 AM

We've discussed some sea faring movies and I believe this is the greatest of all time ~ Battleship Potemkin

https://www.historytoday.com/sites/default/files/potemkin.jpg

In the original Russian it was "Mutiny on the Potemkin":

https://www.historytoday.com/archive/months-past/mutiny-potemkin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_bkBbrdyyw

The ending will have you on the edge of your seat. The movie is absolutely staggering.

Sancho

12-22-2023, 02:43 AM

Sounds interesting, but I guess I don't watch movies too much anymore. I don’t ever seem to have 2 or 3 hours to burn. Even with streaming services where I can hit pause then pick it up a month later and my TV remembers where I was, I just don’t watch many movies. I have gotten hooked on a few series though. I think movies are made to be watched in one sitting, but a good series I can watch at my own pace, an hour here, 5 minutes there, who cares? If I’m watching an episode with a hook at the end, I’ll go ahead and watch 5 minutes of the next episode then click it off. British crime dramas are like that. Also, I don’t want to spoil the show for anyone, but if you’re watching a season-long British who-done-it, it’s usually the least likely guy or the guy with the best alibi in episode 1.

Currently watching Season 3 of Slow Horses on Apple TV. Great fun.

bounty

12-22-2023, 10:09 AM

I think lots of good seafaring type movies---haven't seen Potemkin but hard to beat the hunt for red October and crimson tide.

I actually like the slow watching of movies---i'll ride indoors for 20-45 minutes over a period of days and make the movie last.

Danik 2016

12-22-2023, 03:20 PM

hellsapoppin

12-23-2023, 08:42 PM

Madness is a recurring them throughout MD.

In the Intro Ishmael (whose name is derived from a biblical outcast) tells us he had been contemplating suicide and was inclined to knock hats off of people's heads. Back then, men took great pride in their hats. Such a provocative act would have resulted in a retaliatory pistol shot as people often carried derringers. Thankfully, Ish calmed down and sought refuge at sea. While the ocean provided him with some relief for his madness, it attracted quite number of other aberrant characters such as Jonah the drug dealer, Elijah, Ahab, Pip, Perth the Blacksmith, and other crew members.

At the Spouter Inn, Jonah the drug dealer sells potions that cause deliriums and death. He charges a penny for a gulp of the poison and finds sailors who were eager to buy the stuff. No motive is given and no further details are provided.

The next mad character was Elijah the prophet. He appears to have been a seaman in the past and was acquainted with Ahab's past and reputation. Ish says "he's cracked".

Then there's monomaniacal Captain Ahab. He has one singular aim and that is to find and to dispatch Moby Dick. This is the ultimate madness because the vessel is too small and not suited to the task as he saw it. He screams in his sleep, he repeatedly ignores all the advice and warnings that are given to him, he defies the Law of the Sea by refusing to assist the Rachel in searching for missing sailors, and ignores omens such as when the bird took his hat and when he ignored St Elmo's fire. What's worse is his willingness to take his men to their doom just to satisfy his crazed ego. Friggin guy is crazy!

Pip ~ seems like he had the mind of a child from the beginning. But when pressed into service as a merchant seaman he failed miserably and nearly drowned. His mental incapacity becomes even more evident despite getting shielded by Ahab.

Perth the Blacksmith was introduced towards the end. He is in grief over losing his wife and child. Despite the passing of time, he cannot overcome his grief. Strangely, Ahab says that Perth is not mad enough. That he needs to overcome his grief and must direct his energies towards the ship's new mission of finding and killing MD.

I would venture to guess that the ill fated voyage of the Essex was included in the narrative because the tragedy that occurred caused the seamen to resort to cannibalism in order to survive. This brings to mind that Queequeg was initially portrayed as a mad cannibal. Ultimately, he mellowed as the voyage continued.

"Woe that is madness!"

Woe, indeed. What a mad adventure this whole story was!

hellsapoppin

12-23-2023, 09:39 PM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_LdqKIQ5Uo

songfacts:

https://www.songfacts.com/facts/the-beach-boys/sloop-john-b

"Sloop John B" is a traditional West Indies tune about a sunken boat. It was adapted in 1951 by Lee Hays of the Weavers (as "The John B Sails") and revived in 1960 by Lonnie Donegan. The Beach Boys' folk music buff, Al Jardine, turned Brian Wilson onto the Kingston Trio's recording of the song. For their updated version, Wilson added elaborate vocals and a 12-string guitar part. He also changed some of the lyrics, including "This is the worst trip since I've been born" to "...I've ever been on" as a wink to acid culture.
The song was popularized by The Kingston Trio, who adapted it from a version in poet Carl Sandburg's 1927 songbook The American Songbag. The Kingston Trio's version stays true to the song's Calypso roots, and was released on their first album in 1958. Eight years later, The Beach Boys changed the title to "Sloop John B," and came away with a hit. Their debt to The Kingston Trio goes far beyond this song: The Beach Boys adopted the group's striped, short-sleeved shirts and wholesome persona as well. >>
This was the biggest hit from The Beach Boys landmark album Pet Sounds. The album was the brainchild of Brian Wilson, who got the title when Beach Boy Mike Love suggested dogs were the only creatures that would like it. To keep the animal theme, Wilson put some barking dogs on the album.

more ...

Sancho

12-24-2023, 04:44 PM

I had a couple of thoughts about ‘crazy’ as I was reading this book. I know ‘crazy’ and ‘mad’ are slightly different in the way we use them as well as their basic definition, but I’m going to treat them, as a layman would, both as — nuckin’ futs.

Anyway the first thought I had concerns the essence of Ahab. We have the idea, and it’s generally supported by film and literature, that people change fundamentally when something terrible happens to them.
– A loved one dies or is murdered
– Car crash puts you in a wheelchair
– Rape
– War
Stuff like that. Something awful happens to a happy-go-lucky guy, and now he is totally different, angry, brooding, isolated. Evidently human psychology doesn’t work that way. Sure there’s a period, sometimes a long period, of mourning or depression or anger, but generally people get back to their normal selves after a while. A person who was the life of the party before the car crash, will still be that person when he’s a paraplegic, still cracking jokes. It’s who he is.

I’m thinking Ahab was intense before he lost his leg, and clearly he’s intense after. In fact his intensity is unleashed. The whale didn’t change Ahab. Ahab is Ahab. Boomer is Boomer.

My second thought was — crazy is a sliding scale. What some societies think of as crazy, others consider totally normal. Queequeg considers it normal to feast on his defeated enemies. New England Quakers consider it mad. Even attitudes towards cannibalism between then and now in North America have changed. I must have breezed past the mentioning of The Essex on my first reading years ago, because I didn’t know the story of The Essex. (And we didn’t have google back then) The way I remember it now, from Philbrick’s book, is when they finally rescued the captain of the Essex, he was clutching a femur bone and wouldn’t let go of it. He was also stark raving mad. But he snapped back and he was hired again as captain of a whaling ship. (That voyage also ended badly) Anyway these guys didn’t just eat the dead, they drew straws to see who was next. And yet once the story got out, the attitude back in Nantucket was — ah well, ya gotta do what ya gotta do. I don’t think it’d’ve flown nowadays.

I watched a documentary about a Canadian bush pilot a few years ago. He was taking a pregnant woman from her village in the arctic to the city for medical care. Also on the plane was her adolescent son. The plane crashes and the woman dies. The pilot survives but is badly injured (2 broken legs, I think). The boy is basically okay. They survive for a while, but the food runs out. The pilot discusses with the boy the practicality of eating the woman. (She’d been preserved by below freezing temps) The boy said no. He’d rather die. And he did. The pilot crawled up to the corpse and ate. He survived. When the mounties finally found him they understood what he’d done to stay alive and told him to keep quiet about it or his life would be hell. Well, it’s impossible to keep a story like that under raps, so of course it leaked out. And just as the mounties predicted, his life from then on was hell. In the documentary he’s an old man. The interviewer asked him if he had it to over again what he’d do differently. He said he’d do just as the boy had done.

hellsapoppin

12-24-2023, 04:53 PM

@Sancho

Another great post!

If you read of Captain Healy in Michener's Alaska you will come across a similar tragic tale. Life at sea can readily lead to death at sea. Death and worse.

Sancho

12-25-2023, 01:23 PM

Thanks, Hellsapoppin. And I’ll return the compliment. Reading Moby this time has been much enhanced for me by your comments and the comments of my other friends here on the Litnet. I’m still trying to figure it out, though.

Many parts of the book may seem chaotic and disorganized at first; [*****] said he had "put in so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant, and that's the only way of ensuring one's immortality".

One such enigma I keep coming back to is that big ole oil painting in the Spouter Inn. Ishmael puzzles over it for quite some time. In fact it almost seems as though he’s been trying to suss out its meaning for a lifetime:

…it was only by diligent study and a series of systematic visits to it, and careful inquiry of the neighbors, that you could any way arrive at an understanding of its purpose.

Ismael paints a nice picture of this entryway room of the Spouter Inn. He describes everything in it, not just the painting. Hanging on one wall is weaponry from all over the world — a “heathenish array of monstrous clubs and spears.” He ponders the nature of the people who would use such implements. This is the point in the book where I started to understand Ismael’s nature. He’s a curious soul. He wants to know everything and he’s going to describe absolutely everything to us. And I get the sense he has spent his life trying to understand and come to grips with his voyage on the Peauod. But there’s an implicit warning that he (and we) may never be able to understand everything:

Yet was there a sort of indefinite, half-attained, unimaginable sublimity about it that fairly froze you to it, till you involuntarily took an oath with yourself to find out what that marvellous painting meant.

The quote up top of course is not Melville. It’s James Joyce. I probably ought to reread Ulysses one of these days.

hellsapoppin

12-28-2023, 11:37 PM

Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.
~ Ishmael

Throughout MD we see several references to the Demon Drink and the many pitfalls it leads to.

At the Spouter Inn we see in its environs that it is filled with "shabby shelves, ranged round with old decanters, bottles, flasks, and in the jaws of swift destruction ... Jonah the withered old {drug dealer}". While the liquor can cause harm, it can also cure catarrh and other illnesses [p 32].

Ahab induces his men to swear to voyage to the death of MD by filling them up with drink. Drink and pass he orders. Then he prompts them to swear their allegiance to him. "Death to Moby Dick!" Their drunkenness causes their submission to his will and they seal their unhappy fate that way.

Ch 101 ~ "Decanter"

There was an incident where sailors drank much 'flip' (beer, rum sugar all in one drink) and this nearly caused a tragedy. However, the crew was experienced and they cared for one another thereby averting any such unhappy incident. This because, as Ish says, the crew was British and they were more conscientious than others.

In the end we are introduced to the Bottle Conjuror, Perth the blacksmith. Evidently, he lost everything of value to him in life and it appears that drink caused his irreplaceable losses. He goes to sea (like Ish) to drown out his sorrows. But in the end this ultimately leads to his and the other men's doom.

Thus, Demon Drink contributes to the death of the crew members.

hellsapoppin

12-29-2023, 06:25 PM

Darn ~ forgot to mention that in 1840s and 50s nationwide and particularly in New England there was a very strong Temperance Movement. Many advocated the total cessation of liquor sales and use.

Examples include,

Cleveland's first benevolent society, the WESTERN SEAMEN'S FRIEND SOCIETY, founded the MARINE TOTAL ABSTINENCE SOCIETY in 1840, which survived almost 2 decades. It served the men who sailed Lake Erie and the new canals and attempted to convince these workingmen, along with well-to-do founders, to pledge abstinence from alcohol. In the 1840s, local and national temperance reform was swept up in the Washingtonian movement, which relied upon revivalistic lectures, plays, and literature to achieve the spiritual reclamation of drinkers. Established groups expanded their memberships and several new groups formed, such as the Young Men's Washingtonian Total Abstinence Society and the MARTHA WASHINGTON & DORCAS SOCIETY.

source: https://case.edu/ech/articles/t/temperance

Temperance movement was very strong in New England with Maine having a prohibition law in 1851:

“Not a Particle of Liquor:” 19th Century Temperance
Overconsumption of alcohol in the early 1800s brought real, negative health and societal issues, many of which gave rise to temperance sentiments by the mid-19th century in Vermont and New York’s rural Adirondacks region. Temperance activists were inspired by Maine’s passage of a prohibition law in 1851, the first statewide law to prohibit the manufacture and sale of liquor in the country. In 1853, Vermont became the second state to enact a statewide prohibition law.

https://i0.wp.com/www.lcmm.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/06-Social-Qualities-of-Our-Candidate-LOC.jpg?resize=1024%2C727&ssl=1

source: https://www.lcmm.org/prohibition/19th-century-temperance/

more Temperance movement history:

https://portsmouthathenaeum.org/temperance-in-portsmouth/

Temperance movement in Boston:

https://www.thebostonpilot.com/article.php?ID=185304

The Temperance Movement in 19th century Boston
Thomas Lester OPINION FRIDAY 21ST OF JUNE 2019
In the papers of Bishop Benedict J. Fenwick of Boston is a letter dated June 6, 1836, from Horace Mann, at the time a Massachusetts Representative from Boston, conveying a resolution unanimously passed by members of the Massachusetts Temperance Society. The enclosed resolution reads as follows:

"That it afford us peculiar pleasure to know that a Temperance Society has recently been formed in this City by our Irish brethren on the highly praiseworthy principal of ... freedom from all sectarian difference in religion."

While Mann is renowned for his work in education, he also supported other social causes, which came to the fore in antebellum American society, particularly the abolition of slavery and temperance. In the letter, Mann, writing on behalf of the society, offers its "cooperation in any measure which you may deem expedient to ensure the entire fulfillment of the great object we all so much desire, the consummation of the Temperance cause."

Though there were proponents of temperance during the late 18th century, it did not receive widespread support until the 19th. The Massachusetts Temperance Society, from which Mann writes, was founded as the Massachusetts Society for the Suppression of Intemperance in 1813, preceding the founding of the American Temperance Society, also in Boston, in 1826.

Advertisement
Many of the early societies were predominantly Protestant, but Catholics began to join soon after. Though it contained both Catholic and Protestant members, one of the early examples was the Irish Temperance Society, founded in Boston in 1835, and is most likely what Mann is addressing in his letter. Starting in 1838, Catholics took up the issue in greater numbers after being inspired by the work of Capuchin Father Theobald Mathew in Ireland, who that year started his campaign advocating for total abstinence from alcohol. The attention he received in the United States only increased as his followers, already pledged to abstain from alcohol, arrived in the United States in large numbers as they fled widespread famine at home.

The movement was officially sanctioned by the Catholic Church when the Fourth Provincial Council of Baltimore (1840) encouraged parishes to form their own societies, which inevitably placed Catholic priests in leadership roles. With Bishop Fenwick's blessing, pastors throughout the then Diocese of Boston administered the pledge of temperance to parishioners, and The Pilot eagerly reported the numbers and shared inspiring stories of individuals whose lives were improved through abstention.

As diocesan historians have commented, "almost for the first time Catholics and Protestants appeared to have found one moral crusade on which they could combine, and there was a brief period of what might also be called fraternization." Societies marched in parades together, held joint meetings, and Protestant clergy and Catholic priests visited each other's churches to speak about temperance and administer the oath.

Momentum continued to grow throughout the 1830s, reaching its height during the early 1840s, and then began to ebb. While the movement bridged religious divides, the relationship between groups advocating for responsible use of alcohol and those favoring total abstention became strained. There were also calls for legislative action, leading to laws in Massachusetts controlling the sale of spirits and prohibition in Maine, to name a few, but it is suggested this evolution from social into a political issue may have diminished the enthusiasm of some reformers.

Although after the perceived height of the movement, a highlight was certainly Father Mathew's visit to the United States in 1849. His itinerary included staying several days in Boston, where he was paraded through the streets and spoke at several large gatherings, administering the oath of abstention to thousands, before continuing to visit other cities throughout the state.

Boston preacher who advocated temperance:

https://thebostonpilot.com/news/20190621/images/680x450_Crop_Pilot_19975.jpg

hellsapoppin

12-29-2023, 06:35 PM

I had not been aware of the following: Herman Melville won praise from a temperance journal for his 1850 novel White-Jacket, in which he insists that sailors are predestined to be “driven back to the spirit‑tub and gun‑deck by his old hereditary foe, the ever‑devilish god of grog.”

https://lithub.com/how-american-authors-helped-push-an-agenda-of-temperance/

https://s26162.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Diocletion-Lewis-Womens-Temperance-1200x0-c-default.jpg

Indeed, temperance was something spoken about on a daily basis in those days. This especially in Sunday sermons so that the discussion was something that could not be avoided. Which brings to mind, what exactly was Melville saying by illustrating such debauchery in MD? I believe he was suggesting that demon drink had much to do with the unhappy fate suffered by the crews and ships in the novels and that a life of sobriety was one that led to life's betterment. As a teetotaler myself, I could not argue with his suggestion.

tailor STATELY

12-29-2023, 10:15 PM

An aside: We had a tim270 sighting just a moment ago who posted http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?73044-White-Whales a ways back :)

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor

Sancho

12-30-2023, 04:10 AM

Shocking. And all this from the nation that engendered Carrie Nation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrie_Nation

Here’s Stubb proving he’s a temperance man by turning down a drink with the captain of The Rose Bud, a French whaling ship:

Hearing this, the captain vowed that they were the grateful parties (meaning himself and mate), and concluded by inviting Stubb down into his cabin to drink a bottle of Bordeaux.

“He wants you to take a glass of wine with him,” said the interpreter.

“Thank him heartily; but tell him it’s against my principles to drink with the man I’ve diddled. In fact, tell him I must go.”

“He says, Monsieur, that his principles won’t admit of his drinking; but that if Monsieur wants to live another day to drink, then Monsieur had best drop all four boats, and pull the ship away from these whales, for it’s so calm they won’t drift.”

hellsapoppin

12-30-2023, 11:47 AM

While he may not have taken to drink, Stubb used alcohol as a reward for those who worked harder than others. In "Pequod Meets the Virgin" episode, the crew men of the Pequod make a strenuous effort to haul in a whale. In order to give them even more incentive to haul it in, he offers brandy as incentive for harder work: "Do ye love brandy? A hogshead of brandy, then, to the best man." That is, whoever pulls the hardest gets the drink as reward.

By contrast, Flask offered "slap jacks (pancakes) and quohogs for supper ... {with} baked clams and muffins" as incentive to pull harder.

Despite all their efforts, the dead whale sank. Their efforts were all in vain. We don't know if the officers followed through with their pledge to reward the hard work. But you wonder if the sinking of the dead whale (highly unusual according to the narration) didn't presage doom for the rest of the voyage. I believe it was but another one of the many warnings Ahab and his crew was being given by Nature and by fate.

Sancho

12-30-2023, 04:02 PM

Ah yeah. The chapter about the Rosebud was one of the comedy chapters. The drinking comment was incidental to the main action, which was all about Stubb and a member of the French crew (the Guernsey-man) having a little fun at the expense of the newbie French captain. Stubb, to me, seems like a guy who enjoys bending an elbow from time to time, not a slave to demon drink but a guy who could chug-a-lug a cold-one and engage in a belching contest with his buddies.

Anyway the Pequod has come upon the Rosebud, which is moored to two stinking, rotting whales. The French crew is struggling to extract what they could from the “blasted” whale. The captain of the Rosebud doesn’t speak English so the Guernsey-man acts as translater. Here’s Stubb and the Guernsey-man playing the captain:

To this gentleman, Stubb was now politely introduced by the Guernsey-man, who at once ostentatiously put on the aspect of interpreting between them. “What shall I say to him first?” said he.

“Why,” said Stubb, eyeing the velvet vest and the watch and seals, “you may as well begin by telling him that he looks a sort of babyish to me, though I don’t pretend to be a judge.”

“He says, Monsieur,” said the Guernsey-man, in French, turning to his captain, “that only yesterday his ship spoke a vessel, whose captain and chief-mate, with six sailors, had all died of a fever caught from a blasted whale they had brought alongside.”

Upon this the captain started, and eagerly desired to know more.

“What now?” said the Guernsey-man to Stubb.

“Why, since he takes it so easy, tell him that now I have eyed him carefully, I’m certain that he’s no more fit to command a whale-ship than a St. Jago monkey. In fact, tell him from me he’s a baboon.”

“He vows and declares, Monsieur, that the other whale, the dried one, is far more deadly than the blasted one; in fine, Monsieur, he conjures us, as we value our lives, to cut loose from these fish.”

Instantly the captain ran forward, and in a loud voice commanded his crew to desist from hoisting the cutting-tackles, and at once cast loose the cables and chains confining the whales to the ship.

“What now?” said the Guernsey-man, when the Captain had returned to them.

“Why, let me see; yes, you may as well tell him now that — that — in fact, tell him I’ve diddled him, and (aside to himself) perhaps somebody else.”

“He says, Monsieur, that he’s very happy to have been of any service to us.”

Hearing this, the captain vowed that they were the grateful parties (meaning himself and mate), and concluded by inviting Stubb down into his cabin to drink a bottle of Bordeaux.

“He wants you to take a glass of wine with him,” said the interpreter.

“Thank him heartily; but tell him it’s against my principles to drink with the man I’ve diddled. In fact, tell him I must go.”

“He says, Monsieur, that his principles won’t admit of his drinking; but that if Monsieur wants to live another day to drink, then Monsieur had best drop all four boats, and pull the ship away from these whales, for it’s so calm they won’t drift.”

And as it turns out, Stubb was playing both of them. He knew the blasted whale contained the valuable secretion ambergris, which he was keen on getting. He also had seen and old harpoon attached to the dead whale and he wanted to retrieve it. He was successful with both when the Pequod maneuvered between the Rosebud and the blasted whale.

hellsapoppin

12-31-2023, 07:56 PM

I may have touched on this a bit earlier but the subject deserves more consideration:

The very opening of the book features Extracts that introduce us 'poor devils' and 'devils of a sub sub'. Ever what that may be.

We discussed previously how Ish stumbles upon a Negro church which he calls "Tophet ... {near} ruins of the burnt district". The term is repeated as a portent portending doom on p 69. Tophet, of course, means "hell".

Ahab remains "pecked by some infernal fatality". [p 156] He has wicked nightmares in "his blazing brain ... throbbing from insufferable anguish ... from which forked flames and lightning shot up, and accursed fiends beckoned him to leap down among them ... in hell ... Ahab would burst from this state room, as though escaping from a bed that was on fire." [p 167]

Devils and brimstone [p 180] when pulling oars. More sulfurous imagery abounds when the images ''funereal pyres'' and of a burning ship is shown. It had "emblazonings ... flames from a furnace ... red hell ... The continual sight of the fiend shapes before me, capering half in smoke and half in fire, these at last begat kindred visions in my soul ... [which] made ghastly by flashes of redness ... death ... fatal ... glared like devils ... in the congregation of the dead." [pps 326-328]

When the doomed vessel confronts MD ''tongues of fire'' are heard as Ahab screams like bloody hell. The vessel sinks downward with Ahab and crew like Satan with his fallen angels descending from the Heavens into Hell described as "gaseous Fata Morgana". [p 431] A massive vortex is created and all fall into it except for Ish who was buoyed by the coffin.

Water everywhere - but the voyage ends as all fall into a demon filled and an unquenchable Hell.

Sancho

01-01-2024, 03:49 PM

Ya know, I had some partially formed thoughts concerning the epilogue of Moby Dick, and particularly of the whirlpool created by the Pequod’s rapid sinking.

And now, concentric circles seized the lone boat itself, and all its crew, and each floating oar, and every lancepole, and spinning, animate and inanimate, all round and round in one vortex, carried the smallest chip of the Pequod out of sight.

And here’s Ismael, as always, observing and describing the action from the periphery:

So, floating on the margin of the ensuing scene, and in full sight of it, when the halfspent suction of the sunk ship reached me, I was then, but slowly, drawn towards the closing vortex. When I reached it, it had subsided to a creamy pool. Round and round, then, and ever contracting towards the button-like black bubble at the axis of that slowly wheeling circle, like another Ixion I did revolve. Till, gaining that vital centre, the black bubble upward burst; and now, liberated by reason of its cunning spring, and, owing to its great buoyancy, rising with great force, the coffin life-buoy shot lengthwise from the sea, fell over, and floated by my side. Buoyed up by that coffin, for almost one whole day and night, I floated on a soft and dirgelike main. The unharming sharks, they glided by as if with padlocks on their mouths; the savage sea-hawks sailed with sheathed beaks.

It’s a vivid scene. My first association was of stories I’d heard of sailors in wartime abandoning a sinking ship and then getting sucked into ensuing whirlpool and drowning. I’d mostly heard these stories from accounts of Naval battles in the Pacific in WWII, and I’d always wondered about the physics of it.

With Melville of course it’s loaded. He writes that “concentric circles” took the Pequod. So the image I immediately thought of was Dante’s 9 circles of hell. But then a vortex, although circular, is not concentric. It’s spiral: “Round and round, then, and ever contracting towards the button-like black bubble at the axis of that slowly wheeling circle…” So now the image that pops in my head is of the spiral of stars in the universe, or the singularity at center of a black hole, or more domestically of the swirl of a freshly-flushed commode (who’s singularity is more brown than black, har-har). Anyway the feeling is that once stuck in the pull of the vortex, it’s inescapable. The whole book felt like that — stuck in a vortex of ever tightening circles, things getting weirder and weirder, and heading for an inevitable conclusion. By the chase chapters, the gravitational pull is extreme.

I asked myself — how in the world did Ismael survive? Did he only survive only so as to tell the tale? Did he have to survive? The way I understand it, the initial publishing of the British version left the epilogue out, which practically changes everything. At any rate, it’s something for me to ponder.

Sancho

01-01-2024, 04:03 PM

bounty

01-01-2024, 04:06 PM

hellsapoppin

01-01-2024, 10:58 PM

off in a somewhat related but slightly different direction. I just started reading the caine mutiny and the captain who will eventually experience the mutiny is named "queeg." of all the names in the world herman wouk had to chose from, it makes you wonder why he chose one similar to one from moby dick.

I read the book and watched the movie many moons ago. In all honesty, neither made any real sense to me. As the picture reveals in the end, there never has been a mutiny in naval history despite all the battle fatigue and tensions that existed during combat. A paranoid officer who was losing his faculties and jeopardizing his men would have been relieved of command immediately. This especially when reported to Admiral Halsey whose command was reputed to be impeccably well ordered.

The only real merit to the movie was the superb acting of Humphrey Bogart who to this day has maintained his reputation as Hollywood's greatest actor. Just consider his role in Edward Dymtryk's The Left Hand of God [1955]. Bogie was terribly miscast as a Catholic priest. Despite that he played the role superbly. It's what he always did. He was the best. To me, his role in Caine was so great that he is the only thing worthy of any merit in the movie.

I don't mean to be critical, it's just that the movie & book made no real sense to me. And why a name like 'Queeg"? I don't have a clue. Perhaps I do need to see/read them both again some day.

Sancho

01-01-2024, 11:01 PM

It can’t be a coincidence, but Captain Queeg bears absolutely no resemblance to Queegueg, or to Ahab for that matter.

hellsapoppin

01-01-2024, 11:31 PM

I gotta keep the soundtrack going. Here's one for the cosmic vortex in the epilogue:

The Wheel, Jerry Garcia
https://youtu.be/5ZK8UmvTocQ?si=FbjsqVdHxyOt4oCy

One thing that makes Moby a great book is it's perpetual relevance. It's about a 19th century whaling expedition, but it's about so much more and it continues to speak to us in our own times.

In light of Wallace's disclosures in his analysis and parallels between Melville and Douglass, the book becomes even more relevant today. Am so glad to see that people are discussing it and applying its priceless lessons to today's life.

hellsapoppin

01-01-2024, 11:34 PM

It can’t be a coincidence, but Captain Queeg bears absolutely no resemblance to Queegueg, or to Ahab for that matter.

If Queeg was affected by madness as was alleged in the book (so far as I recall) then it could be said that there was a parallel between him and Ahab. Recall that some of the men (in particular Starbuck) considered a mutiny against him but the deal fell through. Had they done so their lives may well have been spared.

Sancho

01-02-2024, 12:13 AM

Queeg and Ahab are fundamentally different. Ahab would never cut and run. He’d rather die. And he did. Queeg made a habit of it, ole yellow stain or something like that. Both were touched, but by different mental illnesses. Ahab was monomaniacal and Queeg was paranoid.

bounty

01-02-2024, 10:23 AM

i watched the movie a long time ago poppin, but I don't remember enough of it to speak to your experience with it. I love the book/movie combination so maybe i'll watch it again after I finish the book. so far the books been enjoyable.

I did an internet search for "queeg's" naming and didn't find anything. turns out herman wouk died just a handful of years ago at age 103. we could have written him and asked!

yeah, I have a hard time seeing Humphrey bogart in the role of a priest. itd be like those Saturday night live casting skits where kevin spacey does Christopher walken trying out for han solo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzeeAVuTzlE

hellsapoppin

01-02-2024, 07:51 PM

Melville's MD gives a reader the impression he believes there is no free will. That despite all prayers, all beliefs, all sacrifices religious adherents may make, all talk of Divine mercy, all is fated.

When we initially meet Ishmael, he is musing on various things. Then he says, ... my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of the grand programme of Providence that was drawn up a long time ago ... Though I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the Fates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when others were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short and easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in farces—though I cannot tell why this was exactly; yet, now that I recall all the circumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment.

In Ch XLVII - Mat Maker - Ish appears to be weaving a mat of some kind and go into some doldrums. He wonders if he was under some "Loom of Time, and I myself were a shuttle mechanically weaving and weaving away at the Fates ... aye, chance, free will, and necessity - no wise incompatible - all interweavingly working together."

Ahab also believed in Fate - that he was fated to kill MD: “Ahab is for ever Ahab, man. This whole act’s immutably decreed. ‘Twas rehearsed by thee and me a billion years before the ocean rolled. Fool! I am the Fates’ lieutenant; I act under orders.” That is, that we was fated to kill the whale. But Fate had different ideas for him, the vessel, and the crew as "the hand of Fate had snatched all their souls."

Such an unhappy fate for for those unfortunates!

hellsapoppin

01-03-2024, 12:35 AM

Forgot to add an idea and one important line ~ "a strange fatality pervades the whole career of these events , as if verily mapped out before the world itself was charted". In other words, that everything which happened here was fated from the very beginning of time.

~ The Town-Ho's Story p 209

Also, the Sermon ~ it was a lesson on the acceptance of divinely ordained Fate. That in doing so, life may be sustained as Jonah the prophet and the people of Ninevah had when he was allowed out of the belly of the beast and fulfilled his mission.

Sancho

01-03-2024, 12:39 AM

^Nice.

Though predestination is not exactly fate, it sure seems like it from a practicing heretic’s point of view. Also, I believe the Quaker’s doctrinal belief system soundly rejects Calvinism. Be that as it may, this book definitely has the feel that everybody in it is on a one-way collision-course with fate.

Right there towards the end, in the Symphony chapter, it almost seems like Ahab will pull himself and the crew out of their death spiral, but then the inevitability of fate returns and they’re back on the chase. It’s a beautiful day and we catch him in a reflective moment, staring out at the sea. Starbuck also finds him there. Ahab confides to the First Mate that he’s been a lousy spouse and father by being gone all the time — he’s been ashore only 3 out of the past 40 years. He even acknowledges that madness has gripped him in his hunt for Moby. Starbuck sees his opening and implores him to set sail for home. He evokes his own wife and child:

“’Tis my Mary, my Mary herself! She promised that my boy, every morning, should be carried to the hill to catch the first glimpse of his father’s sail! Yes, yes! no more! it is done! we head for Nantucket! Come, my Captain, study out the course, and let us away! See, see! the boy’s face from the window! the boy’s hand on the hill!”

But Ahab is in the grip of fate:

“What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it; what cozening, hidden lord and master, and cruel, remorseless emperor commands me; that against all natural lovings and longings, I so keep pushing, and crowding, and jamming myself on all the time; recklessly making me ready to do what in my own proper, natural heart, I durst not so much as dare? Is Ahab, Ahab? Is it I, God, or who, that lifts this arm? But if the great sun move not of himself; but is an errand-boy in heaven; nor one single star can revolve, but by some invisible power; how then can this one small heart beat; this one small brain think thoughts; unless God does that beating, does that thinking, does that living, and not I. By heaven, man, we are turned round and round in this world, like yonder windlass, and Fate is the handspike.

Dispirited and resigned, Starbuck gives up and wanders away:

But blanched to a corpse’s hue with despair, the Mate had stolen away.

And here’s the kicker — Ahab stares down at the ocean again, but sees more that just his own reflection:

Ahab crossed the deck to gaze over on the other side; but started at two reflected, fixed eyes in the water there, Fedallah was motionlessly leaning over the same rail.

Here’s how Nathaniel Philbrick describes the scene in his book, Why Read Moby Dick?:

This is where Melville is perhaps the most profound in his portrait of Ahab as the demagogue and dictator. In the end, even the fiercest of tyrants is done in, not by his own sad, used-up self, but by his enablers, the so-called professionals, who keep whispering in his ear.

hellsapoppin

01-05-2024, 01:25 AM

Throughout MD there are repeated references to atavistic characters described as cannibals and savages or references to cannibalism and savagery. These are used to illustrate the world of Melville which is one of endless chaos, pain, privation, and unfulfilled desire. Early on we are introduced to Queequeg as discussed previously. He is repeatedly referred to as "cannibal" [pp 39, 40 et seq]. He is a "savage", a "creature in the transition state neither caterpillar nor butterfly" [p 42].

We then learn that the entire environs is populated with "sea dogs" [p 44] and other "wild specimens ... and cannibals" [p 45]. Even the vessel can be viewed as a "cannibal of a craft". [p 72] No surprise, then, that Melville mentioned the ill fated Essex the doomed vessel whose loss caused its crew members to resort to cannibalism.* [p 171]

In this world anyone and everyone can become a "savage" ~ "As with the Hawaiian savage, so with the white sailor-savage ... as with the Greek savage ... full of barbaric spirit ... Dutch savage Albert Durer" [p 219]. They can also become atavists: "Belubed fellow critters ... Cursed fellow critters {are} 'voracious' eaters [p 236]. Previously we learned that Queequeg ate only steaks cooked rare [p 32]. Such voraciousness similar to that of the sharks who gorged themselves on a dead whale and each other [pp 240, 241 et seq].

This is a dog eat dog world where even college educated men like Ahab, princely types like Queequeg, God fearing Christians such as Starbuck, and folks from every walk of life can be or become a savage or an atavist. This notwithstanding invocations such as those of Starbuck who cried "God keep me! Keep us all! [p 140]. All doomed by the evils of an unjust fate and merciless universe.

*https://www.google.com/search?q=the+essex+cannibalism&sca_esv=595870843&rlz=1CAKSOU_enUS1067&sxsrf=AM9HkKlt31ILPwpdwKnWYfG4oYP6u7wiAA%3A1704431 604168&ei=9I-XZaT1CeChptQPv7S5oAg&ved=0ahUKEwikv73CvsWDAxXgkIkEHT9aDoQQ4dUDCBA&uact=5&oq=the+essex+cannibalism&gs_lp=Egxnd3Mtd2l6LXNlcnAiFXRoZSBlc3NleCBjYW5uaWJh bGlzbTIEEAAYRzIEEAAYRzIEEAAYRzIEEAAYRzIEEAAYRzIEEA AYRzIEEAAYRzIEEAAYR0jFE1CACViACXABeAKQAQCYAQCgAQCq AQC4AQPIAQD4AQHCAgoQABhHGNYEGLAD4gMEGAAgQYgGAZAGCA&sclient=gws-wiz-serp

Sancho

01-05-2024, 07:46 PM

I thought the "voraciousness" of the sharks going at Stubb's whale was one of Ishmael's most vivid descriptions:

They viciously snapped, not only at each other’s disembowelments, but like flexible bows, bent round, and bit their own; till those entrails seemed swallowed over and over again by the same mouth, to be oppositely voided by the gaping wound.

Yeech!

As for Queequeg as "a creature in the transition state neither caterpillar nor butterfly," I think it's important to note that Queequeg himself doesn't change. Rather it's Ismael's perception of him that changes, and presumably the reader's perception as well. Ismael, in fact, is almost on a Holden Caulfield level as an unreliable narrator. We get the story told to us through the filter of a full range of Ishmael's emotions, and he changes much from the front to the back cover.

I think I've mentioned it before, but one of the wonderful (and sometimes painful) things about Moby Dick is the level of detail Ishmael gives in his descriptions. I could almost smell the stink of rendering whale blubber into oil as the crew set to work at that task. Then I had a strong desire to tidy up my own place as the crew scrubbed down the ship after they'd butchered the whale. Melville gave us as clear a window into the lives of those people as we could possibly hope for.

hellsapoppin

01-05-2024, 11:24 PM

Sancho,
I could almost smell the stink of rendering whale blubber into oil as the crew set to work at that task. Then I had a strong desire to tidy up my own place as the crew scrubbed down the ship after they'd butchered the whale.

I had exactly the same thought as you did!

hellsapoppin

01-06-2024, 11:26 PM

I mentioned previously that the MD universe is virtually female free with only the inn's cook and Aunt Charity making any significant contribution to the narrative. However, the latter makes an indirect appearance in The Monkey Rope. Through the chapter Queequeg strenuously exercises his duties. In order to give him some relief one of the stewards give him some ginger brew as he had pledged to do to Aunt Charity. Stubb objects and asserts that such a brew is of Temperance origin. Then he lies by saying it is likely to poison Q and the crew if more is given (in fact he is endeavoring to compel Q to comply with Ahab's orders):

Mr. Dough-Boy, where lies the virtue of ginger? Ginger! is ginger the sort of fuel you use, Dough-boy, to kindle a fire in this shivering cannibal? Ginger!—what the devil is ginger? Sea-coal? firewood?—lucifer matches?—tinder?—gunpowder?—what the devil is ginger, I say, that you offer this cup to our poor Queequeg here.”

“There is some sneaking Temperance Society movement about this business,” he suddenly added, now approaching Starbuck, who had just come from forward. “Will you look at that kannakin, sir: smell of it, if you please.” Then watching the mate’s countenance, he added, “The steward, Mr. Starbuck, had the face to offer that calomel and jalap to Queequeg, there, this instant off the whale. Is the steward an apothecary, sir? and may I ask whether this is the sort of bitters by which he blows back the life into a half-drowned man?”

“I trust not,” said Starbuck, “it is poor stuff enough.”

“Aye, aye, steward,” cried Stubb, “we’ll teach you to drug a harpooneer; none of your apothecary’s medicine here; you want to poison us, do ye? You have got out insurances on our lives and want to murder us all, and pocket the proceeds, do ye?”

“It was not me,” cried Dough-Boy, “it was Aunt Charity that brought the ginger on board; and bade me never give the harpooneers any spirits, but only this ginger-jub—so she called it.”

“Ginger-jub! you gingerly rascal! take that! and run along with ye to the lockers, and get something better. I hope I do no wrong, Mr. Starbuck. It is the captain’s orders—grog for the harpooneer on a whale.”

Stubb then proceeds to give Q a large flask of "strong drink" and throws the ginger tea into the ocean. So again we see that Ahab used demon drink to compel his charges to conform to his rigid influence. This is what often happens when the universe is female free.

Sancho

01-07-2024, 03:00 AM

Ah yes, The Monkey Rope. Hey, does OSHA know about this operation?

One of the nice things about Moby is the chapters are generally short. This probably falls into the TMI category, but an average reader can easily knock out a chapter or two during an average bowel movement. Anyway I went back and reread The Monkey Rope… ahem.

As far as I can figure, they are skinning a whale of its blubber with a “blubber hook.” It reminded me of a kitchen contraption we have that peels and cores an apple. The thing has a suction cup so you can attach it to the counter. Then you mount the apple on a couple of spikes. It’s got a spring-loaded blade that leans against the apple and as you turn the apple with a hand crank you get a long strip of apple peel. Magic.

Anyway that’s basically what the whalemen are doing only on a massive scale. Queequeg is acting as the spring-loaded blade while precariously standing atop the whale carcass, which is being voraciously fed upon by sharks. For his safety he’s attached to Ismael by a “monkey rope.” Meanwhile Tashtego and Daggoo are sort of casually killing sharks with their whale spades. Every once in a while Queequeg will put his foot on the head of shark and push him away. Ya can’t make this stuff up. I got the sense Melville had seen this done and was passing it on to us.

I’m sure there’s a literary mechanism or two going on here, but I’ll leave it to you-all to suss it out. Ismael does comment that he is once again married to Queequeg, this time by the Monkey Rope.

As for Doughboy giving Queequeg a ginger brew at the completion of the operation — FOUL! Starbuck was being a good mate by sending him back for some real grog.

I originally pictured Aunt Charity as Frank Reynolds’ Betsey Trotwood. I may have to change my image of her to an axe-wielding Carrie Nation.

hellsapoppin

01-08-2024, 12:00 AM

Seems like a novella could have been written about his life. He was called "Wild Indian" from Nantucket and described as full blooded, having long hair, muscularity, and dark eyes. He gave the impression of being fearless and evolved from being a hunter to becoming a whaler. For some reason he was the one who most picked on Dough Boy the steward.

Tashtego was the first one to perceive Ahab's true quest which was to track down MD [p 138]. He far sighted and was first to spot whales at a distance [p 178]. Thereafter he takes the lead in killing whales by using war hoops "Woo-hoo! Wa, hee!" with Daggoo and Queequeg following his calls [p 228]. In that chapter {#LXI} for some reason Stubbs is credited with the kill though it appears that Tashtego deserved more of the credit. It will be recalled that Ishmael noted earlier that the white race had "pre-eminence in it applies to the human race itself, giving the white man ideal mastership over every dusky tribe. " In this case meaning that the dark harpooners did the heavy work but the white guy got the credit. We see this again later on when Tashtego says he spotted MD from a distance but Ahab claims he spotted the whale first and kept the promised doubloon for himself.

Before that final scene there was an incident illustrated below where Tashtego falls into the water and nearly drowns. It was Queequeg who saves him by grabbing him by his long hair:

https://www.moppetbookspublishing.com/cdn/shop/products/KG_MobyDick_sample_15_1024x1024.jpg?v=1517541627

Lastly, at the very end when the doomed vessel and crew sink into the vortex abyss, Ahab calls out Tashtego's name as he falls into oblivion.

Sancho

01-08-2024, 04:08 PM

^Nice illustration. Queequeg being Queequeg, what-a-guy!

Here’s something I’d like to note about the perspective of the novel. It’s written from a contemporary viewpoint. Melville is writing about contemporary events. To him it’s modern stuff, cutting edge. Most of the books I’ve read about square-mast sailing ships were written from a distance of a century or two. A writer writing from that distance, despite valiant efforts, cannot help but to be influenced by a knowledge of modern ships with huge screws and engines and stuff.

When you think about it, the Pequod is a pretty amazing contraption. Nathaniel Philbrick says it better than I can:

Take, for example, the square-rigged, bluff-bowed whaleship.

Simple and cheap to build, it lasted for decades and could sail around the world without using a jot of carbon-based fuel. It was home to a crew of between twenty and thirty-five sailors who regularly pursued the largest game the world has ever known.

The Pequod is solid. There’s never any doubt in anyone’s mind about it’s seaworthiness. And the Pequod is not a new ship; it’s well-worn. I really liked the perspective. Most of the books I’ve read about wooden ships involved them sailing into a hurricane and sinking, or getting stuck and crushed in a polar ice floe, or running up on a reef and stranding everybody – the focus of the book being the super-human effort of the crew to keep the ship afloat, or to survive after the ship sunk. In Moby, the Pequod sinks of course, but it is due to actions of the captain and crew.

I really want to go visit the Charles W. Morgan in Mystic, Connecticut. I think it’s the last wooden whaleship from that era that’s still afloat.

hellsapoppin

01-08-2024, 05:27 PM

Sancho,

~ Charles W. Morgan ~

A thought occurred to me and I hope I don't sound too dumb by asking but, would the Pequod have survived if she had been made of the same wood used in the USS Constitution?

First let me say that I know very little about this. It was my dad who was the family mariner and he sailed for many years up until the late 1940s. As for me, landlubber till the end.

I know whalers were mostly made of teak wood while warships were made of various forms of oak. Having said that, if the Pequod had 2 or 3 layers of oak, would she have survived the attack MD made against her?? Given the well documented history of unfortunate encounters between whaling vessels and whales, one would think the maritime industry would have changed the wood used in these vessels. Hindsight being 20/20, of course.

I tried searching Google but couldn't find any history re warships and any possible attacks by orcas or sperm whales. Does anyone have any historical accounts of such possible encounters?

hellsapoppin

01-09-2024, 02:13 AM

There are many references to reveries in MD:

—Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reveries.†
Chpt 1-3 *
Let the most absent-minded of men be plunged in his deepest reveries—stand that man on his legs, set his feet a-going, and he will infallibly lead you to water, if water there be in all that region.†
Chpt 1-3
With finger pointed and eye levelled at the Pequod, the beggar-like stranger stood a moment, as if in a troubled reverie; then starting a little, turned and said:—"Ye've shipped, have ye?†
Chpt 19-21
Perhaps they were; or perhaps there might have been shoals of them in the far horizon; but lulled into such an opium-like listlessness of vacant, unconscious reverie is this absent-minded youth by the blending cadence of waves with thoughts, that at last he loses his identity; takes the mystic ocean at his feet for the visible image of that deep, blue, bottomless soul, pervading mankind and nature; and every strange, half-seen, gliding, beautiful thing that eludes him; every…†
Chpt 34-36
And have I not tallied the whale, Ahab would mutter to himself, as after poring over his charts till long after midnight he would throw himself back in reveries—tallied him, and shall he escape?†
Chpt 43-45
So still and subdued and yet somehow preluding was all the scene, and such an incantation of reverie lurked in the air, that each silent sailor seemed resolved into his own invisible self.†
Chpt 46-48
And meet it is, that over these sea-pastures, wide-rolling watery prairies and Potters' Fields of all four continents, the waves should rise and fall, and ebb and flow unceasingly; for here, millions of mixed shades and shadows, drowned dreams, somnambulisms, reveries; all that we call lives and souls, lie dreaming, dreaming, still; tossing like slumberers in their beds; the ever-rolling waves but made so by their restlessness.†
Chpt 109-111
For a space the old man walked the deck in rolling reveries.†
Chpt 124-126
…fishing-ground, and in the deep darkness that goes before the dawn, was sailing by a cluster of rocky islets; the watch—then headed by Flask—was startled by a cry so plaintively wild and unearthly—like half-articulated wailings of the ghosts of all Herod's murdered Innocents—that one and all, they started from their reveries, and for the space of some moments stood, or sat, or leaned all transfixedly listening, like the carved Roman slave, while that wild cry remained within hearing.†
Chpt 124-126

https://www.verbalworkout.com/u/u102/u018582.htm

With reverie defined as "the state of daydreaming".

Seems like so many of the characters (especially Ishmael) were in some perpetual sleep walk or catatonic state. This because the ocean opens up the "floodgates of world wonder" leading to contemplation, speculation, and thoughtlessness. The oceans compel Ishmael to be burdened with "the problem of the universe revolving in" him. This renders him and others into becoming "absent minded young philosophers." [p 135]

"Very often do the captains of such ships take those absent-minded young philosophers to task, upbraiding them with not feeling sufficient “interest” in the voyage; half-hinting that they are so hopelessly lost to all honorable ambition, as that in their secret souls they would rather not see whales than otherwise. But all in vain; those young Platonists have a notion that their vision is imperfect; they are short-sighted; what use, then, to strain the visual nerve? They have left their opera-glasses at home.

“Why, thou monkey,” said a harpooneer to one of these lads, “we’ve been cruising now hard upon three years, and thou hast not raised a whale yet. Whales are scarce as hen’s teeth whenever thou art up here.” Perhaps they were; or perhaps there might have been shoals of them in the far horizon; but lulled into such an opium-like listlessness of vacant, unconscious reverie is this absent-minded youth by the blending cadence of waves with thoughts, that at last he loses his identity; takes the mystic ocean at his feet for the visible image of that deep, blue, bottomless soul, pervading mankind and nature; and every strange, half-seen, gliding, beautiful thing that eludes him; every dimly-discovered, uprising fin of some undiscernible form, seems to him the embodiment of those elusive thoughts that only people the soul by continually flitting through it. In this enchanted mood, thy spirit ebbs away to whence it came; becomes diffused through time and space; like Cranmer’s sprinkled Pantheistic ashes, forming at last a part of every shore the round globe over. There is no life in thee, now, except that rocking life imparted by a gently rolling ship; by her, borrowed from the sea; by the sea, from the inscrutable tides of God." [ 136]

Even Queequeg goes into a state of apoplexy which was explained as his Ramadan. Well, he at least, overcomes his mental paralysis whereas it appears others do not.

But what exactly causes all those reveries? The water, the waves of the ocean, the ship, the nature of the voyage, all the toilsome labor and harshness of the tasks involved in operating a vessel? Or is it a combination of all these factors? One thing's for sure ~ this is hardly a dream world. In fact, as we see in the end of the tale, all but one enter into a hellish abyss. Thus, Paradise it is not.

Sancho

01-10-2024, 04:28 PM

It’s interesting that Melville uses that word so much. It makes me think it was much more prevalent in his time. I remember being a little uncomfortable reading it because it’s not used that much anymore and hence I don’t really have a full understanding of its meanings and etymology and history and all the things that go along with word usage. Also I was too lazy to look it up. So I just wound up gleaning its meaning through context. It does seem to morph around a bit: daydreaming, meditating, ruminating, immersed in deep thought, drifting off to another place, and in some sense doing what soldiers call the 1000-yard stare. At any rate I thought it was an example of how Melville’s language is different from ours — like a WWI soldier fresh from the trenches being “shell shocked,” whereas somebody who’s suffered months of bombing in, say Gaza, has “PTSD.”

Anyway I oughtta start tossing it around at work and seeing if gets any traction. Methinks I can get people using it again.

hellsapoppin

01-12-2024, 08:50 PM

I seem to have run out of ideas/themes to discuss about MD. Am open to other thoughts about this great book which is defo worth a thorough reading.

Sancho

01-14-2024, 03:53 AM

Oh I made a lot of highlights in this book. I could probably go on discussing it for quite some time. Moby of course has been deeply studied for many years and I’m sure I’m not covering new territory here, but it’s new to me and I’ve mostly avoided looking at other people’s scholarship on it, so it’s been a fun discovery process.

Maybe because I knew how things would end, it felt like everyone on the Pequod was living in a deterministic universe. Not so much that everyone’s fate was predetermined by God, but rather everybody had a date with destiny. The stage was set and no amount of free-will was going to change their fate. I think it’s more or less a causal-determinism argument. Starbuck probably came the closest to willing a change to their fate, but in the end he couldn’t quite bring himself to take that final step he needed to take in order to change their destiny.

I kept thinking everybody was tied to their fate by economic forces, and yet a lot of people see this book as an allegory about the evils of slavery. I’ve sort of come around to the conclusion that it’s about both, and of course the two are inextricably tied to each other. For all the high-mindedness of religious ideals, everybody was still bound pragmatically by economic forces. Peleg and Bildad were good Quakers, but they had a business to run, eh? Northern Baptists made arguments about the evils of slavery while Southern Baptists made arguments about the evils of abolition. It seems to me the regional economic situation was the starting point and the moral arguments took shape from there. Why else would clerics from the same church take completely opposite sides on the same issue? It’s clear to us now that one side was right and the other wrong, but it wasn’t clear to them then. Southern clerics truly believed they were right. They were slaves of their environment.

I see some similarities with the economic situation in the US today. We’ve got a lot of people without much money looking at the people with a lot of money and thinking those fat cats are the problem — we do all the work, but they have all the money and they’re holding us down. Then we have the people with a lot of money looking at the huddled masses and thinking they’re the problem — all these entitlement programs for those lazy bums are holding us back. Anyway it’s always those guys who are the problem, not us guys.

hellsapoppin

01-17-2024, 09:11 AM

Sancho,

Then we have the people with a lot of money looking at the huddled masses and thinking they’re the problem — all these entitlement programs for those lazy bums are holding us back. Anyway it’s always those guys who are the problem, not us guys.

Then there are those of us who let those elites know that they are even more dependent on government handouts in the form of abatements, government contracts, incentives, subsidies, tax shelters, etc. That without those government monies [which nobody dares call ''entitlements''] which are financed by working people, those capitalists would have their net profits significantly reduced every year. That the military industrial complex is the biggest collection of welfare queens in human history as we all know but that too many of us are too afraid of openly admitting it. Yes, indeed, there is a lot of criticism that can be spread everywhere.

But let's not stray too far from MD and what it symbolizes ...

Sancho

01-18-2024, 03:54 PM

Hear-Hear

Well said, hellsapoppin.

I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man. You know, the Jungian thing, sir…
(I ripped that off from Joker in Full Metal Jacket)

Where literature is concerned, I wonder how much, on a percentage basis, the average reader is open to new ideas vs the reader seeing what the reader wants to see. I donno. It seems a little like the nature vs nurture question.

One thing I couldn’t help but to notice in Moby was the verb Ismael used several times to describe killing a whale — To murder. You see, I saw what I wanted to see with that word choice, but I’m not at all sure it’s what Melville intended.

Hey, I’m thinking of tackling a Russian novel for my next reading project. Anybody up for Crime and Punishment? or Anna Karenina? or Master and Margarita? or something else?

bounty

01-19-2024, 06:12 PM

im about 1/3 of the way through house of sand and fog and it'll probably take me between 1-2 weeks to finish it.

I mighhhhhhhhhhhhhhhht be able to be talked into reading crime and punishment or anna Karenina but i should say the brothers Karamazov was a challenge and war and peace was a chore.

hellsapoppin

01-20-2024, 12:38 AM

quoting Sancho,

Well said.

Thanks!

murder

I must have missed that. Except for two such references on p 389 [Ch CXXIII] I cannot recall any such imagery or symbolism. Mind you that these were references to people, not whales.

Can you develop this issue a bit more?

Russian Novel

War and Peace along with Anna Karenina are god awful long. Master & Margarita put me to sleep.
Karamazov along with Crime & Punishment are far more readable. If you open up a topic thread of either one, I would like very much to add a few paragraphs to the discussion.

Always enjoyed the 19th century Russian classics, especially Dostoyevsky. There were many other 19th century greats such as Tolstoy, Gogol, Lermontov, Pushkin, Chekhov. Over the years I have not found much informed online discussions about these writers and their works. I believe this is because most American readers are content with reading the plot and enjoy with a book that has a happy ending. You don't see many happy endings in these books because they reflect an unjust and turbulent era in Russia. Like Moby Dick you get a better understanding of those books if you know what happened in that society in those years - this is something most Americans know very little about.

My all time favorite novel is George Santayana's The Last Puritan [1935]. I have searched high and low for a good online discussion of this book but it has been to no avail. Hopefully, some day folks here will start one and I'll happily join!

Sancho

01-20-2024, 08:26 AM

I found this passage. It’s Ismael musing about Stubb’s meal:

It is not, perhaps, entirely because the whale is so excessively unctuous that landsmen seem to regard the eating of him with abhorrence; that appears to result, in some way, from the consideration before mentioned: i.e. that a man should eat a newly murdered thing of the sea, and eat it too by its own light. But no doubt the first man that ever murdered an ox was regarded as a murderer; perhaps he was hung; and if he had been put on his trial by oxen, he certainly would have been; and he certainly deserved it if any murderer does. Go to the meat-market of a Saturday night and see the crowds of live bipeds staring up at the long rows of dead quadrupeds. Does not that sight take a tooth out of the cannibal’s jaw? Cannibals? who is not a cannibal? I tell you it will be more tolerable for the Fejee that salted down a lean missionary in his cellar against a coming famine; it will be more tolerable for that provident Fejee, I say, in the day of judgment, than for thee, civilized and enlightened gourmand, who nailest geese to the ground and feastest on their bloated livers in thy pate-de-foie-gras.

I like how Ismael questions almost everything: earlier “Who is not a slave?” and here “who is not a cannibal?”

I’m kind of leaning towards Crime and Punishment. Dostoevsky published it only a few years after Melville published Moby Dick, but it’s a world away and as we know now, Russia at the time was on the brink of a huge upheaval. Part of what makes me want to read it is a desire to visit a pre-Soviet Russia.

bounty

01-20-2024, 09:32 AM

if you can wait a couple weeks, i'll join in on crime and punishment.

there are ~half dozen threads on the book scattered throughout the forum.

Sancho

01-20-2024, 03:47 PM

Oh hey, I’m in no hurry. One of the great pleasures of reading is that it’s a self-paced adventure. I can read for 5 minutes or 5 hours; finish a book in a day or a month. And if I miss something, I just flip back a couple of pages and read it again. I don’t have to tap rewind on the TV remote and annoy my Señora. Anyway I’ll probably avoid looking at the other threads at first. I like to start these things as a tabula rasa. Also, looks like there’s a couple of folks interested this book, maybe we can find a few more.

On the other subject at hand, here’s a few more uses of the verb in question, hellsapoppin:.

these two mariners, darting their long whaling-spades,*kept up an incessant murdering of the sharks, by striking the keen steel deep into their skulls, seemingly their only vital part.
Chapter 66 The Shark massacre.

Here’s one that stuck with me. It’s from Chapter 81, The Pequod meets The Virgin. The imagery is vivid. The boys have laid chase to a pod of whales, trying to outrun a few German whalers who are also in pursuit, and they notice an old bull whale sort of tagging along behind the pod of females. Ismael notes that old bulls are usually solitary so it’s unusual for this guy to attach himself to the pod. He’s described as “afflicted with the jaundice, or some other infirmity,” and overgrown with “yellowish incrustations”. His spout is weak and his progress is slow. He’s got an unnatural yaw, which Stubb describes as — “it must be, he’s lost his tiller.” It turns out he’s lost his starboard fin to some misfortune. At any rate the whole scene lends itself to anthropomorphizing the old guy. I pictured him happily (and crookedly) swimming along behind the lady whales, nostalgically reliving his glory days as a viral young bull whale. But his trip down memory lane is interrupted by the whalemen:

For all his old age, and his one arm, and his blind eyes, he must die the death and be murdered, in order to light the gay bridals and other merry-makings of men, and also to illuminate the solemn churches that preach unconditional inoffensiveness by all to all.