Moby-Dick discussion
This topic is about
Moby-Dick or, The Whale
Weekly Discussions (Moby-Dick)
>
Week One: Chapters 1 -11
date
newest »
newest »
Newengland wrote: "Thank you, Jennifer. As you know, I admire "old school" (or "old pod," maybe, given we're talking whales).Just checked the phone book for my Massachusetts town (only) and there is but one Coffin..."
You are welcome! My university is in the Eastern Townships of Quebec and we had quite a good number of American students attending from the New England area. Only one Coffin though, during my time there. (Small school.)
I get weirdly excited over things like this - family names & locales. (I have some Newfie blood in me so there is vast entertainment to be had with names and places.) You know you are bookish when reading the phone book seems like a reasonable thing to do! (It totally is a reasonable thing to do! Right?)
29 is impressive.
Jennifer wrote: You know you are bookish when reading the phone book seems like a reasonable thing to do! (It totally is a reasonable thing to do! Right?) Yes, dear, of course it is. Can I get you a nice cup of tea? :-)
That would be lovely. I happen to have been born a tea-granny! :D
Yes, I've seen the name Coffin and met people with the name right here in the Boston suburbs. These must be descendants of the landlubbin' branches of the family. Not as plentiful as Smith and Jones but more common than mine.
Huh. Did a quick check for the Coffin families around here:14 in the Lower Mainland
39 throughout all of BC
Surprisingly "common".
Much more common than I would have thought.Don't have a phone book. But I searched on LinkedIn for "Coffin" as a last name within 100 miles of the Boston Common.
I came up with 173 -- compared to my own which was 209.
When I searched the US as a whole I came up with 1621 -- compared to my own last name which was 8,027.
I think of my own last name as not really common, but not extremely uncommon.
So I'd say it is particularly common in New England.
AND I don't believe I just checked that out.
In 1641 Nantucket was deeded by the English (the authorities in control of the land from the coast of Maine to New York) to Thomas Mayhew and his son, merchants of Watertown and Martha’s Vineyard. It's not clear to me if anyone was living there but Native Americans -- but perhaps.
But here's the big deal
In 1659 Thomas Mayhew sold his interest to the "nine original purchasers": Tristram Coffin Thomas Macy, Christopher Hussey, Richard Swayne, Thomas Bernard, Peter Coffin, Stephen Greenleaf, John Swayne, and William Pike. Some of these names are still common on the island.
The Coffins (and Starbucks and others) were one of the families that got Nantucket into whaling.
With both Coffin and Starbuck, I think Melville was consciously taking Nantucket names.
I also think Tristram Coffin is one of the all time great names, and there are Tristram Coffins today.
I think he would irresistible to Goth girls. :-)
Starbucks(coffee) and Whales now that is a combination. I don't have a phone book so I can't check if we have any Coffin's here. I tried looking on line and only came up with the graveyard type.
Is Starbucks coffee anything to do with Ahab's Starbuck?
I don't know. There is a mermaid image on the front., but it is based in Seattle Wash.
Huh! That's awesome. I may even start to like Starbuck's coffee. Nope, probably not, but that's an interesting bit of info, NE.
Learn something everyday. Coffee has legs and can walk it is so strong.
God, I hate that coffee!You know, when I hear the name Starbuck I always think of The Rainmaker, 50s play about the effect of a rainmaker, Bill Starbuck, on a mid-west town.
What Bill? Not a big Dirk Benedict/ Battlestar Galactica fan?On a more germain tack... (note the nautical term!)
First, as to the quiet breakfast "I was preparing to hear some good stories about whaling; to my no small surprise nearly every man maintained a profound silence. And not only that, but they looked embarrassed." Knowing what I know of sailors ashore, I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the theory that they were all hung-over.
Second, The sermon about Jonah, I particularly liked the line And here, shipmates, is true and faithful repentance; not clamorous for pardon, but grateful for punishment.
I've always been more comfortable with those Christians that approach their religion as a love affair rather than a "what's in it for me" business deal.
I think that it's also important to stress in this day and age just how much more significant a role religion played in the day to day lives of Americans in the 1850's & 60's than it does in our lives today.
Finally, on a different tack (again note the nautical... tack means to change direction)
The end of Chapter 10...
but there is no place like a bed for confidential disclosures between friends. Man and wife, they say, there open the very bottom of their souls to each other; and some old couples often lie and chat over old times till nearly morning. reminded me of what I've heard of the old Amish custom of a bed-date
http://aboutamish.blogspot.com/2009/1...
All the bruhaha of the homeroticism of Melville and even Whitman kind of pales when considered in the light of these old-fashioned non-sex-centric ideas.
Nice quotes, and yet another example of Melville's love of rhetorical devices and parallel structure (not clamorous for pardon, but grateful for punishment).Starbucks coffee tastes like the tar used as a sealant on ships. It's a wonder it's not made in The Tar Heel state as opposed to Washington. That Yuppies think it is "good" and pay extra money to prove so just shows that P.T. Barnum knew of what he spoke: There's a coffee snob born every minute.
If Starbucks gets its name from Melvill's Starbuck, why doesn't it put in the damned possessive apostrophe?
Stephen wrote, "All the bruhaha of the homeroticism of Melville and even Whitman kind of pales when considered in the light of these old-fashioned non-sex-centric ideas." Personally, I don't see what one has to do with the other. I'm think we're past the historical moment when suggesting homoeroticism may be a theme, whether major or minor or not at all, is a brouhaha.
One thing does deny the existence of another, and Melville is nothing if not multifarious.
And what Melville's central theme(s) is(are) far from clear. There are multiple themes -- and multiplicity itself is a decided theme (view spoiler) The themes that interest me most have to do with cannibals&Christians (view spoiler) hunting&exploitation and madness&sanity.
Stephen wrote, "I think that it's also important to stress in this day and age just how much more significant a role religion played in the day to day lives of Americans in the 1850's & 60's than it does in our lives today.
There's no question that's the case, but the even more interesting question is what the relevance of that is for Moby-Dick.
Bible stories are more front and center as a central cultural myth, certainly -- although his attitudes toward any of them can be hard to pin down. (view spoiler) Melville also seems to be torn between religious feeling and a decidedly non-religious interpretation of the world, how the world presents itself in an ironic contrast to religious interpretation.
Sarah,
Perhaps, Sarah, he considers each restaurant an individual "Starbuck" and the enterprise itself, consisting of many, are "Starbucks".
Perhaps the original apostrophe fell into the formula and that's why the coffee tastes so bad.
:-)
Gives you enough pause for thought Bill. (apostrophe in mix)
One element of the novel that I appreciate is the short chapters. That has a "modern" feel to me. In the last chapter this week, "Nightgown," I also like how at least half of it reads like a digression on sensual pleasure. I enjoy how Ishmael discusses how nice it is be under the covers in a cold/cool room. He even slips in a comment on class - how the rich can't know that pleasure because they keep the fireplaces going in their bedrooms. I couldn't help but agree - nothing worse than an overheated bedroom.
I'm going to put the passage down in the Lines and Passages file.
S. wrote: "One element of the novel that I appreciate is the short chapters. That has a "modern" feel to me. In the last chapter this week, "Nightgown," I also like how at least half of it reads like a digre..."
Yes, that was a good chapter and I also enjoy the short chapters. It adds to the momentum, moving forward through a long novel.
Forgive me for coming so late to this discussion; I just wanted to add something to Petra's excellent post.I've been thinking about the biblical Ishmael--I'll use his Hebrew name, Yishmael, to distingusish him from the Moby Dick character--quite a bit lately, because this is the time of year, in Judaism, that we read the sections of the Torah that deal with him.
(The Torah is the first five books of what Christians call the 'Old Testament;' all synagogues read the same sections of the Torah each week.)
Two things I noticed: like Yishmael, Ishmael apparently had a difficult step-mother. Granted, she probably wasn't as tough as our matriarch Sarah, who actually demanded that Avraham expel Yishmael and his mother, abandoning them in the wilderness. But Ishmael's step-mother also seems to have made life unpleasant.
Secondly, in the Torah Yishmael has an interesting role right after a devastating time for Avraham and family. Some time after Avraham expels Hagar and Yishmael comes the troubling story of the binding of Isaac: G-d demands that Avraham sacrifice Isaac. Avraham appears, at least, willing to comply. G-d stops him at the last minute.
(As someone mentioned, in the Islamic version of the story Yishmael is the one that Avraham nearly sacrifices. In both cases, the idea is that he must sacrifice his favorite son--the one he's pinning all his future hopes on.)
We don't see Sarah ever speaking to Avraham again after the binding. In fact, right after the binding the Torah tells of her death, and we're left to wonder if she knew about the ordeal and if the shock of it killed her.
Heck, we don't even see Isaac walking back down the mountain with his father immediately after the binding; Avraham returns alone.
Hence there's a lot of speculation, in Judaism, about how broken the family was after what happened. Yet, when Avraham died, Yishmael--who had plenty of reasons of his own to despise his father--showed up and helped Isaac bury him. (See Genesis 25:9) Despite everything, he was there for his father and his half-brother.
It's a poignant moment in the Torah: Yishmael, the outcast son, returns and does his duty by his deceased father--and there's no mention of jealousy or resentment on his part.
I'm not sure how that fits in with the character of Ishmael, but I thought it was worth mentioning. Apologies if someone has already brought all this up--I'm still catching up on this thread!
Petra wrote: "I posted this in the pre-sail thread by mistake:
I quickly wiki'd the biblical Ishmael:
- Ishmael is a figure in the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an and was Abraham's first born child. Ishmael w..."
No a wonderful post J Rosemary. Thanks for the information.
J. Rosemary wrote, "Two things I noticed: like Yishmael, Ishmael apparently had a difficult step-mother."I don't think it's true that Ishmael had a difficult step-mother or I missed it completely. God knows, that's possible. But what leads you to make that inference?
I don't think we know anything that specific about his background, except that, if we assume Ishmael is talking about himself (and I'm willing to make that assumption because it is Melville's background):
It touches one's sense of honour, particularly if you come from an old established family in the land, the Van Rensselaers, or Randolphs, or Hardicanutes. And more than all, if just previous to putting your hand into the tar pot, you have been lording it as a country schoolmaster, making the tallest boys stand in awe of you...
That's all we know of Ishamael. Melville came from American aristocracy on both sides (although not those families) and was a schoolmaster. He did not have a step-mother.
Melville's father had a hard time making a living, despite his education, and the family was perpetually in need of money.
I think the Ishmael/Yishmael connection may be that -- a sense of never quite having what should have been his by reason of his lineage, although it is difficult to pin down precisely Ishamael's attitude to it. He's certainly mocking himself by talking about being descended from the Hardicanute -- an eleventh century Danish king who was the son of King Canute and Emma of Normandy.
Thanks for all of that Rosemary! I had been doing some reading about Sarah so appreciate this information from you!
Bill wrote: "J. Rosemary wrote, "Two things I noticed: like Yishmael, Ishmael apparently had a difficult step-mother."Where in Moby-Dick does Ishmael say that?"
In chapter 4 I believe Bill. He is ruminating about an event: when his step-mother put him to bed without supper for a small infraction. I don't remember the exact passage, but it is there,.
Here it is Bill.I felt worse and worse- at last I got up, dressed, and softly going down in my stockinged feet, sought out my stepmother, and suddenly threw myself at her feet, beseeching her as a particular favor to give me a good slippering for my misbehaviour: anything indeed but condemning me to lie abed such an unendurable length of time. But she was the best and most conscientious of stepmothers, and back I had to go to my room.
Thanks, Rosemary, for all that info! I'm terribly behind in the reading (due to Life, not disinterest in the book). From the little I've read so far, Melville seems too smart of an author to not have meant some connection between Yishmael and Ishmael. I'm fairly confident that there will be other parallels as we read on. Kitty, thanks for the reference. I kind of remembered a story but not the specifics. I'll go back and read that again.
Thanks, Kitty, I found it.Hmm. That passage suggests that it may or may not have happened -- whether it was reality or a dream I never could entirely settle -- I took it that Ishamael was just making up a storybook stepmother because it's so exaggerated, so storybook AND he refers not to his stepmother but his mother in the same sentence about the same incident.
But I'm not sure an editor might not have helped with that paragraph. :-)
Bill--Hmmmm. I think only the sense Ishmael had, when he woke up, of a supernatural hand in his was possibly a dream and not real. I think the difficult step-mother who "was all the time whipping me or sending me to bed supperless" was real. As for step-mother versus mother--in Ishmael's case (unlike in Yishmael's) he most likely wouldn't have had a step-mother and a mother at the same time. There's was no legal polygamy, and divorce was rare, so if he had a step-mother, his birth mother was likely dead. It wouldn't be unheard of, in that case, for him to refer to his step-mother as his mother.
Jennifer--Your welcome! In the Torah it's clear that Isaac (or Yitzhak, if I want to be consistent about using Hebrew names, lol) mourned his mother Sarah--he comforted himself with his wife Rifkah--but not so clear how he felt about the death of Avraham. I imagine his feelings were more complicated!
There's a Jewish commentary or story (a midrash) that speculates that Yitzhak was not just blind in his old age--that he went blind younger, as a psychological reaction to seeing his father hold a knife to him.
More to the point here, there's another midrash that sees Avraham asking G-d which son G-d is demanding that he sacrifice: there's the horrific implication that he might have chosen to give up one son over the other; namely, Yishmael over Yitzhak. Edit: "On the other hand, Avraham might have pointed out that he has two sons in an effort to buy time . . . hmmmm. I'll have to think on this!)
I don't know how familiar Melville was with Judaism, but I'm guessing not familiar enough to have ever heard that midrash. But it comes to my mind anyway. There's also nothing in the midrash to say that Yishmael knew about that--but it's still amazing that he was there to bury his father with Yitzhak when he had plenty of reasons to stay away from the family.
J. Rosemary wrote: "Bill--Hmmmm. I think only the sense Ishmael had, when he woke up, of a supernatural hand in his was possibly a dream and not real. I think the difficult step-mother who "was all the time whipping m..."There's no way to know for sure. But the story-book like characterization, the blithe manner he mentions it, make it seem unreal.
But I can't prove it. Your case is as good as mine.
Fair enough, Bill!Meanwhile, on another topic this thread addressed: was the relationship between Ishmael and Queequeg just an intense bromance or were they sexually involved?
Just my two cents, but given all the marriage comparisons and the entwining of legs together and what not--well, they're more than BFF's. They should immediately move to New York or Massachusetts and start picking out china patterns.
And the fact that I'm a lesbian myself has nothing to do with that opinion. NOTHING!
(Well, ok, maybe a little . . .)
LOL nothing like bias eh J Rosemary.
Loving all these portmanteaus. First bromance, then (just read in the GLOBE this week) "broga" (for real guys -- whatever that means -- who do yoga).Either Queequeg is too religious for such dalliances or his culture couldn't care less one way or the other. Ishmael's sangfroid about the whole thing, on the other hand, is another kettle of whale...
Bill wrote: "Thanks, Kitty, I found it.Hmm. That passage suggests that it may or may not have happened -- whether it was reality or a dream I never could entirely settle -- I took it that Ishamael was just ..."
While the reference to both step-mother and mother in this passage may be due to an editor's error, I read it more as an expression of how Ishmael felt about her at the time. Ismael seems to call her step-mother when he is angry over being sent to bed, but mother when he was commenting on how she was generally good to him (I forget the exact wording of this part of the passage, no book on hand).
Stephanie--Interesting, I like that interpretation, but I didn't take Ishmael's words that way. When he begs his step-mother to relent in the punishment of grounding, he says, "But she was the best and most conscientious of stepmothers, and back I had to go to my room." I took that "best and most conscientious" as tongue-in-cheek. :P
J. Rosemary wrote: "Stephanie--Interesting, I like that interpretation, but I didn't take Ishmael's words that way. When he begs his step-mother to relent in the punishment of grounding, he says, "But she was the best..."That's a nice interpretation too :)
Moby-Dick
Books mentioned in this topic
Little Women (other topics)Pride and Prejudice (other topics)
Just checked the phone book for my Massachusetts town (only) and there is but one Coffin. Have a phone book for a whole slew of towns in Maine where we have a Thoreau cabin and there are (brace yourselves) 29 Coffin families listed (I'm sure some are related, but wow... a LOT).