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Sep 12, 2011

Matt rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

52 comments like (95 people liked it)

Jan 15, 2012

Esteban rated it:

Everyone eventually comes across the White Whale in one form or another. The trick is to not keep its attention for too long.

*****

Avast! Dost thee have a five spot thou can see thyself parting ways with?

No?

Jibberjab up the wigwam! Cuisinart the poopdeck!

What’s that ye say? Thou canst not make heads nor tails of what I sayeth?

Here then. Let me take this pipe outta my mouth and stop menacing you with this harpoon. Better? Goo More...

29 comments like (46 people liked it)

Nov 02, 2009

Bram rated it:

This is a curious and unwieldy book. At times (and too frequently) it reads like the more excruciatingly detailed scenes of Robinson Crusoe; at others the zany songs, goofy scenes, and curious characters prove Pynchon and DFW to be no pioneers in their lighthearted pursuits. The descriptive prose occasionally builds into an alliterative tornado where form, content, and raw urgency combined to leave me buzzed and page corner-bending. There’s a staggering amount of wisdom dressed up in whale-sp More...

58 comments like (34 people liked it)

Sep 11, 2011

Logan rated it:

I have to admit to a long-standing curiosity about Moby-Dick (not least of which is why the albino whale’s name is hyphenated in the title but just plain Moby Dick in the text itself). I read and loved a Reader’s Digest condensed version (gasps of dismay echo across the Metaverse at this news) of this book around second grade and have always wondered what the arbiters of taste at Reader’s Digest decided to leave on the cutting room floor. Could it have been an illicit love scene between Ishma More...

16 comments like (22 people liked it)

Aug 03, 2008

Jamie rated it:

So, Herman Melville's Moby Dick is supposed by many to be the greatest Engligh-language novel ever written, especially among those written in the Romantic tradition. Meh.

It's not that I don't get that there's a TON of complexity, subtlety, and depth to this book about a mad captain's quest for revenge against a great white whale. And on the surface it's even a pretty darn good adventure story. And, honestly, Melville's prose is flowing, elegant, and as beautiful as any writing can po More...

15 comments like (60 people liked it)

Feb 13, 2012

Keely rated it:

In 1819 in Manhattan, a strange trial was commencing. A merchant of that great city had been found in possession of barrels of spermacetti, the fine-quality oil which may be obtained from the head of the Sperm Whale. When an inspector demanded he pay the proper taxes on his goods, the merchant, who apparently made a hobby of science, declared that he had no fish product in his possession, and so the tax did not apply. He was duly arrested and, contending the charges, a trial was begun to determi More...

11 comments like (9 people liked it)

May 04, 2010

Scroutch rated it:

Moby Dick is in one of my Top 10 books of all time. Maybe that doesn't mean a lot to you who do not know of my impeccable taste, but that is neither here nor there. Anyone who isn't a total asshole would recognize that Melville is a bad-ass and that Moby Dick is a masterpiece.

First of all, let me just say that I love the word "monomaniacal." Second of all, allow me to confess that I would totally make out with Captain Ahab. Whale bone peg legs are fucking hot, and so is be More...

6 comments like (20 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Matt rated it:

You know, it feels a little ridiculous to even write a review of _Moby-Dick_, because it's _Moby-Dick_, and what's the point of reviewing it? It's _Moby-Dick_. But for what it's worth:

I think I developed a complicated relationship with this book. On the one hand, I never sat down to read it thinking, "Ooh, boy! Let's read!" It often felt more like a task or quota to fulfill than enjoyment. But, when I did sit down to read it, I usually, at some point, felt a large swe More...

4 comments like (29 people liked it)

Jun 18, 2008

Erik rated it:

I first read this when I was nineteen; I did not enjoy reading it nearly so much as I enjoyed having read it. Every summer, a friend's daughter comes home from college, and together we read books she's interested in. This summer, she said she wanted to read MOBY DICK. I was not at all interested, but I'd never say no to a student who wants to read this book.

The past three weeks of reading have been unadulterated joy. The book: I get it, now, I finally get all the fuss. Harold B More...

1 comment like (16 people liked it)

May 16, 2008

J rated it:

I have often said that if trapped on a desert island, I’d want Thor Heyerdahl’s Kon-Tiki as the one book with me (rim shot). Being serious, I’ve later decided that since Catch-22 suits my mood any time I pick it up, that would be my real choice. Yet every time I read Herman Melville’s towering Moby Dick, I firmly believe that no other book should suffice.

It’s one of those books you always mean to read. “Oh yes, I’ve got Moby Dick on my list and Gravity’s Rainbow and Ulysses and Remem More...

0 comments like (17 people liked it)

Jan 29, 2008

Rob rated it:

Moby Dick is probably two or three books that, if separated, could be good - Ahab's whaling story, a book on the anatomy of whales, and the narrator's tale of largely religious self exploration - and it's easy to see how someone could love it.

But I don't - frankly, I find the mix frustrating. With Ahab's story, which was the most interesting part to me, every time it gets a bit of momentum the narrator interrupts with a chapter along the lines of 'More About The Whale's Eye' that co More...

2 comments like (14 people liked it)

Apr 18, 2008

Izetta Autumn rated it:

When I first attempted to read this book, I was in a first-year Creative Writing Class. At the time, I was less than enthused about reading yet another white male, after a long run of school assigned reading of only white men. So I was resistant. And perhaps rightly so. After years of not having the opportunity to read international literature and literature by people of color, to my heart's content, I needed a break. An opportunity to explore and revel.

And then I re-read Invisible M More...

6 comments like (6 people liked it)

Apr 13, 2011

Amanda rated it:

Second read, October 2010. Stand by everything. This might be my favorite book.

*******

Surprisingly funny, wholly engaging, and deserving of its lofty rank among the canon of American literature; I enjoyed every page of Melville's Moby-Dick. And although I think a book of this length intimidates a lot of people, I honestly thought the story had a lot of momentum and always looked forward to getting back into it. So don't fear the spine width.

I was warned going More...

3 comments like (8 people liked it)

Aug 27, 2011

Grahm rated it:

I first read Moby Dick in college. It's ponderous, cumbersome, difficult and wordy. It's also brilliant. Most of the book is written in iambic pentameter and it creates a natural rhythm as you read, much like the ocean waves. And he's very evocative in his language. He not only paints pictures of the scenes his characters are hanging out in, but he goes into great detail explaining the backgrounds and uses of all the bits and pieces of whaling gear that make up the set.
There's an entir More...

1 comment like (5 people liked it)

Jun 01, 2008

Joseph rated it:

Incredible. Incomparable. Ineffable.

One of the most challenging and most intense novels to which I have ever put my mind. Over the course of reading this book, I encountered resistance. When I said I was reading it, someone responded, "On purpose?" Just today, finishing it in a cafe, a couple sitting across from me spoke of the book to each other. "Have you read Moby Dick?" asked the girl. "I tried but it didn't do it for me," said the guy. Who are these More...

3 comments like (15 people liked it)

Jun 17, 2008

Rebecca rated it:

Um. This is the weirdest, most outrageous book I've ever read. Using words like "classic" and "epic" and "desert-island-book" is just way too banal for this enormous, bizarre, utterly insane novel. I was in turn amused, bored, outraged, irritated, and charmed, but mostly blood-thirsty for the business of KILLING WHALES to begin.

Ishmael, in the first paragraph, says, "I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world." More...

2 comments like (22 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Eric rated it:

"Novelist" is too small a term for Melville--he's some kind of shaggy Norse bard, writing rhapsodic yet precise, musuclar yet dulcet Elizabethan-tinged English at the midcentury high noon of "realism." For the time and place, the book and the man are uniquely American products, such as only America's social fluidity, untamed confusion of forms and sheer what-the-fuck randomness could produce: a sketchily educated scion of a declined old family goes to sea as a common sailor, More...

0 comments like (13 people liked it)

Dec 28, 2007

Alexander rated it:

I read this in a week, on a trip to Tokyo. I started it on the plane over, finished it while I was there. There was something about the way being submerged in a foriegn language while reading it made it more intense.

I found it weirdly thrilling for how it seemed to me to be this whole novel about the handsome tattooed Queequeg, and the strange beautiful relationship he and the narrator have, and then wham! The whale.

In some ways, the long aria-type chapters about whales More...

8 comments like (6 people liked it)

May 11, 2011

Jessica marked it as to-read

I totally started this once and was pleasantly surprised by an engrossing beginning: homoeroticism and a punk rock character, not at all what I'd expected! I fully intended to keep reading past page fifteen, and I'm still not sure where I went wrong. I guess I was yahooing it up in those days, and probably this whale of a book (come on, it's long) (uh, that latter wasn't supposed to be a pun....) didn't fit in with my rather sailorly lifestyle. Now that I'm all sedate and sophisticated, I hope t More...

7 comments like (4 people liked it)

Jan 18, 2010

David rated it:

There once was a grouchy alpha whale named Moby Dick who -- rather than being agreeably shorn of his blubber and having lumpy sperm scooped out of his cranium like cottage cheese -- chose life. Unlike so many shiftless, layabout sea mammals of his generation, Moby Dick did not go gentle into that good night. This whale, in short, was not a back-of-the-bus rider. He assailed a shallow, consumerist society, which objectified him only as lamp oil or corset ribbing, with the persuasive argument of h More...

10 comments like (50 people liked it)

Apr 27, 2011

Weinz rated it:

Damn you DK.
___________________________________________________________

If anyone wants to go whaling this weekend I am now an expert on the subject. Leave your harpoons at home though; we don't want to hurt them.

5 comments like (5 people liked it)

Nov 15, 2011

Alex rated it:

"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme." (Ch. 104)

"In this world, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if you never violate the Pythagorean maxim)." (Ch. 1)

These two quotes sum up Moby-Dick for me. The first is obvious: Melville has indeed written a mighty book on the mightiest of themes, and that's why Moby-Dick is so great. The second is subtler. It turns out that the Pythagorean maxim he's referring t More...

14 comments like (3 people liked it)

Apr 14, 2008

Colie! rated it:

The best part of reading Moby Dick is looking for unintentional innuendo. The title begs for it. So far, I believe this is my favorite chestnut: “At first he little noticed these advances; but presently, upon my referring to his last night’s hospitalities, he made out to ask me whether we were again to be bedfellows. I told him yes; whereat I thought he looked pleased, perhaps a little complimented.”
I've had similar experiences myself.

Right on. Now that I've finished the bo More...

4 comments like (7 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Rachel rated it:

I am endlessly irritated by the inclusion of Moby Dick on 8th Grade English class syllabi.

Just because you CAN slog through 800 pages about whale hunting at 14, doesn't mean you should.

Moby Dick was a life changing book...but until you've had your own white whale, until you've foolishly imperiled yourself and the people who care about you in the name of something that will only screw you in the end, how can you possibly get anything from this book?

2 comments like (10 people liked it)

Mar 04, 2011

Andrew rated it:

Thanks a lot, Melville. No, that’s okay. Really, I wasn’t using my brain for anything else. I’ll just obsess about marine mammals 24/7 from now on. That’s fine.

I think about whales all day now, and dream about them all night, having finally finished this mammoth tome after years of aborted attempts. “Mammoth” is not even a sufficient adjective to convey the intimidating biggitude of this literary cetapalooza, because whales are much bigger than elephants, all their immediate kin, and More...

5 comments like (7 people liked it)

Aug 02, 2010

Patrick rated it:

Ah Moby Dick. Now I can say that I've read it, including the technical chapters. I am almost never a fan of long books. I feel that authors, for instance Nabokov, that write too much often begin to lose their hold on their message and meaning, and ultimately the reader. However, Moby Dick needs to be taken in stride with an understanding that Melville did not simple write a book, but a tome that immortalizes the whale, the ocean, and the madness that drives us all to the end of our own diabo More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 23, 2008

Esther rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

4 comments like (5 people liked it)

Feb 23, 2008

W rated it:

"Call me Ishmael"--God will listen. Strange name for a pretty godless rant, which is really one of the top four books in America. The bible story has Abraham chasing Hagar and their son, Ishmael, out of camp in favor of Sarah and Isaac (one of the two saddest stories in the the bible), so the questionable confidence in a Christian god is always challenged.

Speaking of Moby Dick, I am reminded of Maxwell Perkins habit of giving his best writers: Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Wolfe, More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

Jun 10, 2007

Justin rated it:

I really didn't know what to expect from this book other than what comes down the pike (i.e. crazy man with one leg captains a whaling ship and wants to seek revenge on the whale that bit his leg off). For one, I'll just say that this book is much more a celebration of whales--or, more specifically, the sperm whale--than it is a book about killing whales. I mean, don't get me wrong: If the whole idea of catching and slicing up whales make you squeamish, you will probably be horrified by more tha More...

2 comments like (3 people liked it)

Mar 18, 2009

Matt rated it:

I liked this particular edition (Univ. of California, Illus. by Barry Moser) more than any other edition of Moby Dick, for two primary reasons: 1) no notes or appendicies! and 2) it has great aesthetic qualities.

The lack of explanatory notes and interpretive essays, I count as a "plus." This is the kind of book you read for pleasure, and which you display as a masterpiece of American writing. It is not a tool or study guide, and yet, neither is it the sort of thing you buy More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

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