Week 1 - Chapters 1 - 20

[Everyman]

Adelle wrote: "What drives Ishmael to take to the sea? "

Given the emphasis on water in the early chapters, I have a feeling that the meaning of the sea will be a significant aspect of the book going forward.

[Silver]

I loved the introduction to Ahab, if it can be called that, since thus far (at least up to my reading, we have not actually met him in person yet)

I particularly loved this passage when Ahab is first being described to Ishmael:

"But I don't think thou wilt be able to at present. I don't know exactly what's the matter with him; but he keeps close inside the house; a sort of sick, and yet he don't look so. In fact, he ain't sick; but no, he isn't well either. Any how, young man, he won't always see me, so I don't suppose he will thee. He's a queer man, Captain Ahab- so some think- but a good one. Oh, thou'lt like him well enough; no fear, no fear. He's a grand, ungodly, god-like man, Captain Ahab; doesn't speak much; but, when he does speak, then you may well listen. Mark ye, be forewarned; Ahab's above the common; Ahab's been in colleges, as well as 'mong the cannibals; been used to deeper wonders than the waves; fixed his fiery lance in mightier, stranger foes than whales. His lance! aye, the keenest and surest that out of all our isle! Oh! he ain't Captain Bildad; no, and he ain't Captain Peleg; he's Ahab, boy; and Ahab of old, thou knowest, was a crowned king!"

I have to say, in spite of the reassurance of Peleg that Ahab is a "good man" this does not seem to be to be a description that would inspire a great deal of confidence or reassurance about the man one was about to intrust his life to essentially.

That allusions of him being "sort of sick" or not sick but unwell seems to me to possibility indicate that he might in fact be mentally unbalanced to say the least, patiently in the references of some people thinking he is queer, as this does imply that there is something abnormal about him.

The mystery thrown over him and allusions which are made about him does seem all very foreboding.

And I have to say that in addition to the humorous aspect of the book, one other thing of which I never would have guessed at or expected in reading it is the "Paganess" about it. I also find Melville's treatment of said subject to be quite interesting, for in some ways he does seem to have an almost ideal/romantic view of it particularly in regards to QQ but Ahab is a bit more of a sinister reference it seems. But it seems to me that Melville does have at least a certain respect for the old beliefs, and certainly Moby Dick does not seem a completely vilification of it, which strikes me as somewhat surprising considering the time period as well as the heavy Biblical allusions.

[Rosemary]

Adelle wrote: "Everyman wrote about "truths" unmapped truths, in post 259. And Patrice, post 288, greatly influenced me, too. She had written about how maps keep changing as the facts keep changing, and about how often countries would claim areas on their maps that they didn't "legally" own, etc. "

Mm. I very much agree the post of Everyman's I think you're referencing here- I haven't gone back to find the number- where he pointed up the idea that the most important places in his life aren't on any map (until Google!) because they aren't big famous places- the important places in all of our lives are small, insignificant to others.

That post, your post, and Bill's idea about QQ perhaps creatively embellishing his biography (I don't agree, but it was an interesting idea) got me thinking more seriously about my flip "neverland" comment earlier.

You know, some of the places that are realest to me aren't real places at all- Narnia, perhaps. And when it comes down to it, how much more real than Narnia are my memories of my childhood home? Yes, my home is physically real and I can go there and my parents still live there, but what is real and special about it isn't any more concrete than what makes Narnia real and special to me.

I wonder if that's part of what Melville is getting at here?

[Rosemary]

Adelle wrote: "Maybe he's not (post 280) "snubbing all regilions."

Of course, maybe he is. Maybe he was sick and tired of the restrictions his own religion had put on him.

But I, too, found Father Mapple's sermon moving."

So far I'm not convinced that Melville coming down (through his characters and events) one one side of the debate or the other about religion (traditional religion is good vs. traditional religion is bad). If anything, he's saying both at once- it's a false dichotomy anyway, IMHO. He's gently mocking some rituals and observances while simultaneously pointing up the power of well-executed religion (Father Mapple's sermon, which I also found moving).

But I may just be projecting my own beliefs here!

[Audrey]

Could someone please explain what about Father Mapple's sermon is so compelling? I didn't find it particularly interesting, but everyone's comments make me think I must be missing the point.

[Silver]

Audrey wrote: "Could someone please explain what about Father Mapple's sermon is so compelling? I didn't find it particularly interesting, but everyone's comments make me think I must be missing the point."

I am with you. I have to say I generally find semons in books to be less than compelling to me. But perhaps that is becasue I do not have much interest in sermons in general. But whenever I have to read long preaching speaches it is usually difficult to keep my attention from drifting.

[Audrey]

I think the contrast between Bildad and Peleg is what makes them such an effective pair. It's why they were able to play Ishmael so effectively at the beginning. Ishmael mentions at some point that they were old shipmates, so they clearly had plenty of time to refine their style and learn to play their opposing personalities for the utmost effect. And I think they are intentionally doing so throughout this chapter. Only Ishmael doesn't realize it. He thinks that's just how they are.

[Silver]

Bill wrote: Did you see the Peck's performance that Eman posted? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IctEOuPGd... of it?
If thats not compelling to you--there's probably no explanation that's going to make it so.
I found the clip much more compelling then the text.

..."

I will have to check that out and see if I am compelled.

[MadgeUK]

Silver wrote: and maybe it is also meant to give that feeling of the heavy hand of fate which has been cast upon the characters and cannot be escaped.

I like this interpretation of why Melville uses so much foreshadowing Silver. It might also be because he knows he is embarked upon an 'epic' which raises a multitude of topics and he feels the need to 'set the scene' in his readers' minds.

[MadgeUK]

'A soul's a sort of a fifth wheel to a wagon.'

As someone without a soul (because I can't comprehend what it is) I rather like the idea of being better of without one:). Religious people do seem to worry a lot about the effect life might have on 'their eternal soul'.

[MadgeUK]

In Jewish tradition Elijah represents the Messianic days when there will be no war and people will not have to fear each other. In the annual ritual of the Passover Seder, which commemorates the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt, a place is set at the table for Elijah and sometimes the front door is left open for his 'visitation'. This represents the notion that Elijah's arrival would precipitate the coming of the Messiah and the 'end of days'.

Elijah's presence in MD may therefore represent the end of the world prophesies in both The Book of Revelation and in Jewish tradition and perhaps Ishmael's peremptory dismissal of him is a repudiation of these traditions or a way of saying 'not yet'? Most of us are familiar with the Doomsayers forecasting the end of the world and we tend to find them tedious too.

[[deleted user]]

Bill wrote: "Adelle wrote: "perhaps Ishmael isn't so much open-minded as he's tolerant?..."

Ishmael's much too patronizing in Ramadan to be opened minded isn't he? I mean the chapter oozes with condescension ..."

Bill!!!! Regarding spoiler: That is astoundingly marvelous. I read ch 21 and didn't make the connection. I LOVE it.

[[deleted user]]

(Everyman...I had no idea there were Quaker jokes. Thanks for sharing.)

[Everyman]

Audrey wrote: "Could someone please explain what about Father Mapple's sermon is so compelling? I didn't find it particularly interesting, but everyone's comments make me think I must be missing the point."

I didn't read it, so I don't know how it would come across read off the page, but when read in the audiobook, delivered as a sermon is intended to be, I found it strangely compelling.

This isn't strange to me -- very often when I have listened to a speech delivered by a good speaker, then read the transcription of the speech, I wonder why I thought the speech was so good. The techniques of written and spoken communication are quite different.

[[deleted user]]

Some historical context about Father Mapple's speech. Fr. Mapple is based on Edward Thompson Taylor, a "sailor's parson," whose preaching influenced Emerson and Whitman as well with its imaginative verve. Emerson called him "the Shakespeare of the sailor and the poor." He wrote of a typical Taylor sermon that it was "A string of rockets all night." And, elsewhere, that Taylor "rolls the world into a ball and tosses it from hand to hand."

The period of, roughly, the 1820s to the 1850's saw a significant change in the style of sermonizing in New England. (In the south as well, but for different reasons and with different results.) Formulaic sermons hewing close to Puritan doctrine evolved into extemporaneous imaginative performances. Taylor called himself "a Unitarian graft on Methodist stock."

In his very interesting book Beneath the American Renaissance: The Subversive Imagination in the Age of Emerson and Melville, David S. Reynolds writes that the new, popular sermons reflect "the nineteenth-century religionist's search for poetic alternatives to doctrine." In liberal Boston the hands that were rolling the ball were coming to be understood as not God's, but man's. (Most of the this post is drawn from Reynolds.)

Although Emerson had worried in the 1820s that sermon technique was becoming more highly prized than doctrinal explication, he was very strongly influenced by Taylor's nonconformity and individualism.

Taylor: "I am no man's model, no man's copy, no man's agent." Emerson: "Trust thyself: every man's heart vibrates to that iron strong."

Reynolds notes that Jonah sermons were commonplace in the early 19th century. The 1839-1840 edition of Sailors' Magazine contained six of them. From one: "If you would be above fear in storms, then commit the helm to him, as your pilot, whom the winds and the sea obey."

So in Moby Dick Melville is drawing on a conventional form (the colloquial, popular sermon) but he does more--and this is what distinguishes the work and makes it both literary and, in the process, makes it subversive.

The sermon is an opportunity for Melville to out-Taylor Taylor. For example, while Taylor did preach from the "prow of the ship," Melville has him ascend to it by a rope ladder! Although he sticks with the traditional structure of the doctrinal sermon, in the end he completely undermines the Puritan view of predestination. The message of the Jonah story in the Sailors Magazine" sermon, like most, is to trust God as the pilot and "commit the helm to him." On the contrary Mapple's climax includes lines like: "Delight is to him, who gives no quarter in the truth, and kills, burns, and destroys all sin though he pluck it out from under the robes of Senators and Judges."

On one level this is a reference calling for opposition to the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. On a deeper level it resonates with Emerson's radical assertion in his Divinity School Address of 1838 that truth is found in nature and oneself not in texts--even sacred ones. "But now the priest's Sabbath has lost the splendor of nature; it is unlovely; we are glad when it is done; we can make, we do make, even sitting in our pews, a far better, holier, sweeter, for ourselves."

In sum, while using their form, style and nautical imagery Fr. Mapple seems to be an intensified version of the traditional. But a big change has been made; where usually it is clear that God is the pilot who sailors must trust, now Mapple casts man as "the pilot of the living God," the "speaker of true things."

And that is subversive indeed.

[CK]

Yojo Ramadan and Destiny

Here are some interesting threads to tangle together:

Ishmael continually refers to the Presbyterian church, which is a branch of Christianity that believes in predestination, which gets a bit messy when talking about free will, but I'll leave that be.

QQ declares that Yojo has informed him that Ishamel will know by his gut, which ship they are to sail with.

"...had already pitched upon a vessel, which if left to myself, I, Ishmael, should infallibly light upon, for all the world as though it had turned out by chance"

this sounds to me like they are predestined to the Pequod

so...
if Ahab and the Pequod are giving off all these vibes of evil and hell as mentioned in several posts,
and considering the ways that Melville has written about QQ's pagan religion.....

Is Melville saying that the pagan religion is leading them to this hellish future or demonstrating the wisdom of Yojo to know that this is a test that the souls of Ishmael and QQ must endure?

[CK]

ha ha looks like I stirred the pot a bit :)

[Silver]

Everyman wrote: "But a question. Is it consistent with Ishmael's character that he is so quickly able to see the real man, the wisdom, in QueeQueg, but blind to it in Elijah?..."

I cannot help but to wonder if in fact Ishmael's dismissing Elijah off as being a "humbug" as he calls it, or a crazy man was not in fact a conscious effort upon his part because he did not in fact really want to see/admit the truth to himself. And so he preferred to be deaf to what Elijah was telling him less he have to admit some folly on his own part, and risk forswearing the voyage which he set himself upon.

As he remarks within Chapter 20

But when a man suspects any wrong, it sometimes happens that if he be already involved in the matter, he insensibly strives to cover up his suspicions even from himself. And much this way it was with me. I said nothing, and tried to think nothing.

He is beginning to have certain doubts, about all of this business, and his signing himself away to ultimately place his life in the hands of Ahab without ever even lying eyes upon him, but he cannot admit to himself the possible error in doing this.

He chooses to be blind less he should see the truth which would be too much for him to admit to himself.

I have to say that whole business, in talking about souls, and the emphasis that Elijah had placed on the fact that they had already signed themselves to ship put me in the mind of one selling their soul to the devil.

[Silver]

Audrey wrote: "When I first read the line about souls, my first association was the idea of signing one's soul over to the devil, and my brain immediately cast Captain Ahab as the devil. Upon more thought-out re..."


Hahaha I had that same impression. During that whole converastion the very first thing that popped into my head as well was the idea of one signing thier soul to the devil.

[Silver]

I am curious, is there any special meaning to Peleg interpreting Queequeg's name to Quohog, which is the name of a particular type of clam.

I thought perhaps this may have some relation to the way in which QQ is initially judged by his outer appearance, or perhaps he even does use his outer appearance, that image of the cannibalistic savage as a defense mechanism, it is like his harder outer shell to keep most people at a distance from him while only Ishmael thus far has gained his confidence and was able to see who he was beneath all the tattoos.

And when he first is introduced to Peleg and Bildad he is immediately judged for his appearance but once they se his true skill and ability they set aside their own prejudices against him.

[[deleted user]]

Silver wrote: "I thought perhaps this may have some relation to the way in which QQ is initially judged by his outer appearance, or perhaps he even does use his outer appearance, that image of the cannibalistic savage as a defense mechanism, it is like his harder outer shell to keep most people at a distance from him while only Ishmael thus far has gained his confidence and was able to see who he was beneath all the tattoos.
"

I don't know, I don't think Queequeg does try to keep people at a distance. I don't even think he's that aware that his appearance is that out of the ordinary; remember his fashionable tall beaver hat! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bea...

[Silver]

M wrote: "Silver wrote: I don't know, I don't think Queequeg does try to keep people at a distance. I don't even think he's that aware that his appearance is that out of the ordinary; remember his fashionable tall beaver hat!..."

Perhaps not, I was just thinking of before him and Ishmael became close friends, whenever Ishmael happened upon in the inn the way in which he described him gave this image of QQ sitting there stoically alone.

Though I am not sure I would say that he is completely obvious to the fact that his appearance is a bit out of the ordinary. He must be aware to how people react to him when they first see him, and he knows that he is different, because he left his home island in order to explore Christendom. So I do not think he is that "naive" about what other people might think of him.

[MadgeUK]

Thanks Zeke. Sermons were not only preached but published at this time and became 'bestsellers' so Melville's reference to a particular preacher's sermon would have chimed with his reading public.

http://www.victorianweb.org/religion/...

[Everyman]

Zeke wrote: "Some historical context about Father Mapple's speech. Fr. Mapple is based on Edward Thompson Taylor, a "sailor's parson," whose preaching influenced Emerson and Whitman as well with its imaginativ..."

Great post, Zeke. And well placed, after we have read and initially discussed the sermon, now we can enrich our understanding with a really fine exegesis of the background Melville was working in.

I was missing you a bit -- glad you're coming through for us in spades!

[Everyman]

CK wrote: "Y"...had already pitched upon a vessel, which if left to myself, I, Ishmael, should infallibly light upon, for all the world as though it had turned out by chance"

this sounds to me like they are predestined to the Pequod "

I had missed that point. Excellent comment!

Makes one wonder whether the whole voyage is predestined. We should keep this question in mind as we read forward.

[Everyman]

Silver wrote: "I cannot help but to wonder if in fact Ishmael's dismissing Elijah off as being a "humbug" as he calls it, or a crazy man was not in fact a conscious effort upon his part because he did not in fact really want to see/admit the truth to himself. And so he preferred to be deaf to what Elijah was telling him less he have to admit some folly on his own part, and risk forswearing the voyage which he set himself upon. ."

That would be a wholly human response, wouldn't it?

Since Melville had just recently discovered and reveled in Shakespeare, it does remind me a bit of the soothsayer's warning to Julius Caesar, prophetic advice which Caesar also disregarded.

[Silver]

Everyman wrote: That would be a wholly human response, wouldn't it?"

Yes I think people are quite adept at deceiving themselves when the truth is something they do not want to hear or becomes too inconvenient to them. I think this is something many can relate to and have done on scales both great and small.

[Silver]

Bill wrote: "In All Astir Ishmael says this:

But it was startling to see this excellent hearted Quakeress coming on board, as she did the last day, with a long oil-ladle in one hand, and a still longer whali..."

I believe that traditionally women were not permitted on board ships generally speaking. Sailors are often highly superstitious because of the dangers of their trade and there was an oft held belief that women on a ship were bad luck. So it may have been startling, or unexpected for him to see a woman boarding this ship because such was not something that would typically be permitted, and did not oft happen.

It may also be because of the way in which she is described as being "excellent hearted" and named Charity itself. This image of the goodness of this woman does create quite a stark contrast to all that is ominous and foreboding surrounding the ship and its voyage, and how much death is associated with the trade of whaling.

So it is startling to see this vision of goodness where there presides so much gloom.

[Silver]

Bill wrote: I find it very interesting how Melville repeatedly brings these contrasts up--where always the fearful is accompanied by the comforting...or suddenly the comforting becomes, in some sense, fearful. ..."

That is quite interesting and now that you mention it, you are right, that contrast is one that does come up many times in varrious different ways.

[CK]

Silver wrote: "Everyman wrote: "But a question. Is it consistent with Ishmael's character that he is so quickly able to see the real man, the wisdom, in QueeQueg, but blind to it in Elijah?..."

I cannot help b..."

In addition to Ishmael's need to dismiss Elijah in order to avoid admitting any mistake on his own part, there is the amount of time spent with Elijah compared to QQ. Ishmael's knee-kerk reaction to QQ was almost entirely negative. It was only after having time forced upon him, waiting for QQ to arrive and then watching QQ in secret did Ishmael stop to consider that he might be judging too hastily.

[[deleted user]]

Silver wrote: "Bill wrote: I find it very interesting how Melville repeatedly brings these contrasts up--where always the fearful is accompanied by the comforting...or suddenly the comforting becomes, in some sen..."

Yes, and I hope that comforting side keeps coming once they're away from land! But maybe that sort of warm comfort is a "land" thing that you know you will have to give up once you set out to sea.

[Everyman]

Several posters have mentioned the often sly humor in Melville. I was re-reading the early chapters this weekend and came across a note about a passage which may not be understood by all contemporary readers.

Melville writes in Chapter 1: Finally, I always go to sea as a sailor, because of the wholesome exercise and pure air of the fore-castle deck. For as in this world, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if you never violate the Pythagorean maxim), so for the most part the Commodore on the quarter-deck gets his atmosphere at second hand from the sailors on the forecastle. He thinks he breathes it first; but not so. In much the same way do the commonalty lead their leaders in many other things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it.

Now, when he mentions Pythagoras, he isn't talking of the theorem, but of a maxim of Pythagoras to "avoid beans" because of the flatulence they create. Now, in the context of this passage, when the sailors in the foredeck emit gas, with the usual headwind it travels back to the quarterdeck, blown away from the common sailors back to be enjoyed by the officers.

The rest of the passage is also very interesting, the concept of the commonality leading the leaders without their realization.

[[deleted user]]

Oh, my! I did miss that one. :-D

[CK]

Thank you Everyman! That's funny!

[Roger]

Everyman wrote: "Several posters have mentioned the often sly humor in Melville. I was re-reading the early chapters this weekend and came across a note about a passage which may not be understood by all contempor..."

Hmmm. But in a sailing ship, the wind will not blow from the fore-castle to the quarter deck, unless she is taken aback. Normally the wind will be coming from abaft. Even if she is tacking into the wind, it will not be much forward of the beam, except when she is actually turning.

[Evalyn]

Everyman wrote: "We start now on one of the most iconic books in American literature, opening with one of the most famous opening lines in all literature – right up there with “It was the best of times...” or “It i..."

I've always been intrigued by the opening line too. As a writer, I know the value of a catchy opening but it isn't all that easy to come up with. We engage with Ishmael immediately because of the opening line. Not a bad feat for a writer.

[Everyman]

Evalyn wrote: "Everyman wrote: "We start now on one of the most iconic books in American literature, opening with one of the most famous opening lines in all literature – right up there with “It was the best of t..."

Good to see you here, Evalyn! We've been missing you.

[[deleted user]]

Bildad. Though I had read The Book of Job, the names mostly leave me. Bildad was one of Job's friends. Bildad speaks a number of times in the Book of Job. Mostly, it seems, sitting comfortably and telling Job that if God is punishing him, then Job must be guilty of something...And Job coming down on Bildad, telling he is of no help whatsoever. Sigh. It would be beneficial to read Job. There isn't time enough.

[Audrey]

Interesting. And it fits the character, with his holier-than-thou aura. So, this begs the question: Is there a Job to Melville's Bildad, and, if so, who?

[[deleted user]]

Audrey wrote: "Interesting. And it fits the character, with his holier-than-thou aura. So, this begs the question: Is there a Job to Melville's Bildad, and, if so, who?"

Great question. I'm inclined to think that Ahab is Job. As someone brought up, he a "god-man" or is "un-godly." Seemingly quite the contradiction. I don't know. Ahab has so many admirable qualities. WAS he a fine upstanding (!) man before he lost his leg? Job believed himself to be an upstanding man before God. Even God thought Job was. But God took the restraints off Satan so that Satan could torment Job. Perhaps Ahab FELT himself to be akin to Job.... Punished for no good reason. Or, Job could not see the meaning behind what happened to him. In Job, I think, towards the end of the book, there was something along the lines that it is permisable to complain TO God, but it is wrong to complain OF God. I just don't know. And, I don't remember Job well enough. Great question.

[[deleted user]]

Bill wrote: "Adelle wrote: "Great question. I'm inclined to think that Ahab is Job. .."

.It would be impossible for Job to say I'd strike the sun if it insulted me.

."

Yes. That would be impossible. yes. And I like your stress on the "living act and the undoubted deed."

In the sentence describing Ahab as a god-man yet "un-godly" there was mention, I think, of a Job-whale.

IS THERE, might you think, might any think, symbolic importance to the mention of Job. Happy to read any thoughs/musings/suppositions...Chapter 46, Surmises....

Smile, Bill, you've taken much of the wind out of me sails! Because you make such excellent points on Ahab.

But I really want there to be something Job-like about someone, anyone, in Moby Dick....so I suppose I will eventually "find" something.

K.

[Laurel]

Peleg is found early in Genesis in one of the "begats." All we know of him is that his father was Eber, he had one brother: Joktan, he lived 239 years, and he was called Peleg (division) because "in his days the earth was divided" (1 Chronicles 1:19, 25; Genesis 10:25, 11:16-19). The dividing of the earth has two possible applications: either the division of la gauges at Babel that caused people's to spread out over the whole earth or else the dividing of the continents into their present configurations.

[[deleted user]]

Laurele, thank you for looking that up.

And then I googled, to see if I could get a bit more information on the Biblical Peleg. I didn't, but I found thru word origins that from the Greek, peleg means "from the sea or ocean." Maybe something in that.. Perhaps just a name Melville liked.

[[deleted user]]

A nice quotation from chapter 16 I ran across, which may resonate now that the group is further along in the book:

“As I walked away, I was full of thoughtfulness; what had been incidentally revealed to me of Captain Ahab, filled me with a certain wild vagueness of painfulness concerning him. And somehow, at the time, I felt a sympathy and a sorrow for him, but for I don't know what, unless it was the cruel loss of his leg. And yet I also felt a strange awe of him; but that sort of awe, which I cannot at all describe, was not exactly awe; I do not know what it was. But I felt it; and it did not disincline me towards him; though I felt impatience at what seemed like mystery in him, so imperfectly as he was known to me then.”

[[deleted user]]

Zeke wrote: "A nice quotation from chapter 16 I ran across, which may resonate now that the group is further along in the book:

“As I walked away, I was full of thoughtfulness; what had been incidentally revea..."

Nice quote, Zeke. And throughout the book, in spite of all, there IS something which attacts the men to him and disinclines them not.

[Everyman]

Zeke wrote: "A nice quotation from chapter 16 I ran across, which may resonate now that the group is further along in the book:

“As I walked away, I was full of thoughtfulness; what had been incidentally revea..."

Very nice quote, Zeke. Ahab continues to be a character I have a hard time getting a grip on.

[Evalyn]

Zeke wrote: "A nice quotation from chapter 16 I ran across, which may resonate now that the group is further along in the book:

“As I walked away, I was full of thoughtfulness; what had been incidentally revea..."

That is a good quotation, Zeke. Is it psychological damage from the loss of his leg that leads to the mystery of Ahab, I wonder...

[Gayle]

Everyman wrote: "S. Rosemary wrote: "What I find interesting is that I find Moby Dick on the whole more racist than Huck Finn"

Interesting! I think the comparison to Huck Finn, a white and a non-white on a voyage..."

Okay, I am really sorry that I didn't get to read Moby Dick along with the group. Life happened and I am just now getting around to it. I planned on reading through the posts and only commenting after I had completed an entire thread. But I give up. My list of comments is becoming unwieldy.

On the Melville vs Twain and racism, I think it is important to note that Twain grew up in a slave state--though he obviously wasn't racist. Melville was a Northerner--and though he held anti-slavery views--like many Northerner,he was probably raised with a gentler version of racism. His years at see would have broadened his view of mankind--world travel does that to all intellectual "divers" as he calls them.

This is my first time to read Moby Dick, though I am a great fan of "Benito Cereno," which is a remarkable work using the literary convention of the unreliable narrator to totally lead the reader astray. Melville's skill at showing events strictly from the perception of the narrator is uncanny. Because of this, you can't trust any statement of any character to reflect Melville's view. From the few Melville works I have read, I would say he was much more interested in making his readers think about deep issues and make up their own minds than providing his own perspective on the matter. He doesn't try to answer the big questions--he just points to the questions and gives you plenty to chew on so that you can't come up with easy answers.

[Everyman]

Gayle wrote: "Okay, I am really sorry that I didn't get to read Moby Dick along with the group. Life happened and I am just now getting around to it. I planned on reading through the posts and only commenting after I had completed an entire thread. But I give up. My list of comments is becoming unwieldy."

Sorry you couldn't join us at the time, but the thread will stay open, and we welcome any comments you have.

[Gayle]

Bill wrote: "Patrice wrote: "I didn't think that the ship was the world. I thought that the ship was, perhaps, the ship of state. Or the people in the church. The ocean is the world with all of it's unpredictab..."

Traditionally, the Ocean is a symbol for God--Vast, unfathomable, sometimes calming and beautiful, sometimes overwhelming and threatening--and as chapter one says--we are compulsively drawn toward water, must have it to survive. (I remember watching an educational movie in grade school called "Hemo the Magnificent" about the circulatory system. I remember it starting out saying that our blood is basically salt water --or sea water. For Ishmael and others like him, the sea is their life blood.)