Imminent Demise

Although in a sense, Moby Dick is not necessarily a character, it is considered by many as an allegorical force that many readers have debated to be a representation of God. Like God, Moby Dick is seen throughout the novel as a mysterious, powerful being that humans cannot oppose or defy. As Ishmael explains, a whale mostly remains hidden, only appearing from the deep depths of the ocean to observe the human world. Likewise, God, although known by many, is still ultimately seen as an unknowable, mighty force that largely remains hidden to humans, even when he is amongst and ‘interfering’. This varying idea of God can be seen within the Pequod’s crew; Ahab is very overconfident and almost views himself as a god in his ruthless pursuit of Moby Dick. Thinking he is immune to nature, he relentlessly hunts the ocean in order to seek revenge against Moby and that, like a god, he can achieve his revenge against all odds despite numerous godly signs. On the other hand, Starbuck is a religious man who uses his Christian faith to provide answer and interpretation to his life events.

With this said, a particular extract I found interesting is by N.E. Primer:

“Whales in the Sea

God’s voice obey.”

As the Pequod and its crew ultimately end in demise (save for Ishmael), Moby Dick arises the victor once again. After reading this extract, one can further strengthen the idea of the connection between God and Moby Dick. As it is said in the bible, verse 10: “In that he is god, he is able to avenge himself on those who oppose…” If we were to accept the idea of Moby Dick acting as an allegorical representation of god, then the demise of Ahab and the Pequod crew seems very fitting. Like verse 10 states, for anyone who “opposes” god (Moby in this case), then ‘God’, is able to “avenge himself.” This statement seems to bring upon the idea of the personification of god and his ability to interact with humans and the world.

This idea however, can be seen throughout Moby Dick as well. In Chapter 119, The Pequod is caught in a typhoon where “God’s burning finger has been laid” on the ship and Starbuck sees Ahab’s three ‘good omen’ spermaceti candles as warnings against the quest for Moby Dick (549). Furthermore, when Starbuck sees Ahab’s harpoon flickering with fire as well, he interprets it as God’s opposing force against Ahab. Starbuck tells Ahab that “God is against thee” but Ahab continues to “blow out the last fear” as he tells the crew there is nothing to be worried about (552). Although Starbuck warns Ahab of the imminent dangers if he choses to pursuit Moby Dick, Ahab stubbornly continues, believing he is immune to God’s reach.

The idea of relating Moby Dick to God can also be seen simply in the regard in which Moby and God is held. Moby Dick, like God, is seen as a largely unknown force that seems to be ‘everywhere’. Both are generally passed on and depicted through word of mouth or stories. Moby Dick is even considered by some to be a myth. There are numerous tales of Moby Dick sightings but one has yet to prove there is really such an animal. Even Ishmael, our whaling expert, has trouble accurately identifying parts of the whale during his first hands on experience. This varying idea of what Moby Dick really is symbolizes humanities inability to truly understand the world. There may be some things in the world that need not as why but just let be for the better.

This varying depiction of God and Moby and the Pequod’s doom both seem to further support the idea of Moby Dick representing the idea of God. If this was the case, then it appears that Melville is depicting God as a vengeful, interfering ruler who seeks revenge on whoever opposes him. This seems to be a bit contrasting to the narrator’s (Ishmael) view of religion. Therefore, perhaps Melville is trying to show that religious belief, as a whole, ultimately leads to ’demise’. This would more make sense, as the only survivor left after the final battle with Moby Dick, is Ishmael, saved by Queequeg’s coffin.

Whales Are Big

Sometimes words fail to convey the magnitude of things that we want to describe. For instance, the national debt of the United States of America is fourteen trillion, nine-hundred and ninety billion, two-hundred and ninety-five million, two-hundred and ninety-seven thousand, six-hundred and thirty-six hundred dollars and thirty-six cents, as of 1:33 pm on Friday, March 11, 2011. Certainly, that number sounds big; it took half a paragraph to write out in words. You might even say it’s a whale of a debt.

Reading Herman Melville’s novel and listening to him illustrate the colossal size of Moby Dick and other Sperm Whales in his novel “Moby Dick” is a lot like listening to a discussion about the national debt and other national financial matters. You need to slowly read and think about it to fully comprehend it’s size, which is similar to the way you need to read “Moby Dick” in order to understand the magnitude of the whales that Herman Melville is describing.

Throughout Herman Melville’s novel “Moby Dick,” Melville makes sever attempts to describe the enormousness of Moby Dick (and sperm whales in general) as the reader struggles to grasp his dimensions. In the chapter Cetology, Ishmael unveils his system for classifying and describing whales. He says that the Sperm Wale is “the largest inhabitant of the globe; the most formidable of all whales to encounter; the most majestic in aspect….”

They must not have known about Blue Whales back in 1851, because I just did some research on Wikipedia and it says that the Blue Whale is the “largest animal ever known to have existed.” Regardless, the Sperm Whales that Melville writes about in Moby Dick may not have been the largest animals in the world, but it would certainly take a lot of comprehending to imagine the size of a Sperm Whale for someone who has never seen one in real life.

Throughout the novel, Melville also makes references to arches made out of the jawbones of whales. One such reference in Chapter 3 describes the Spouter-Inn. “Projecting from the further angle of the room stands a dark-looking den-the bar-a rude attempt at a right whale’s head. Be that how it may, there stands the vast arched bone of the whale’s jaw, so wide, a coach might almost drive beneath it.”

This description of the size of a whale’s jaw helps to put the immense size of the whale in perspective. It also enables the reader to appreciate the bravery of the sailors on the Pequod for their willingness to hunt such enormous and dangers animals.

The magnitude of the Sperm Whale has also been observed by the pot John Milton in his epic poem Paradise Lost.

“There Leviathan,

Hugest of living creatures, on the deep

Stretched like a promontory sleeps or swims,

And seems a moving land; and at his gills

Draws in, and at his trunk spouts out a sea.”

-Paradise Lost.

I believe that even though this quote implies that whales have gills (which they don’t) does a good job of impressing the size of the whale upon the reader. It compares the whale to a mass of moving land. I believe that is a pretty good analogy; although, I’ve never seen a Sperm Whale in person; judging from the pictures I’ve seen on the internet; I could almost certainly walk on the back of a Sperm Whale.

The descriptions that Melville and Milton have made about whales are quite remarkable. They must be read carefully in order to appreciate the size of these gigantic creatures and to value the courage of the men who hunt such massive animals.

Ouroboros and Universal Cannibalism

The concept of “the universal cannibalism of the sea” is one discussed at length in class. Essentially, the concept of universal cannibalism is the idea that everything in life is cyclic. It is best embodied by the ancient Ouroboros, which is a widely-used image of a serpent eating its own tail. Melville confines this concept to the sea in the physical realm of his novel, but it's clearly a concept that can be adopted on a wider scale.

It is very clear that both Herman Melville and Herbert Marcuse have noted the presence of self-reference or self-perpetuation. In fact, both authors take the concept so far as to deem it a necessary and constant component in the machine of life. The major difference between the two lies in the fact that Melville appears to express a level of discomfort with this idea. Marcuse seems to matter-of-factly believe that this cyclical, universal cannibalism is necessary and a neutral force in the universe. He says, “The ancient idea of a state where Being attains fulfillment, where the tension between 'is' and 'ought' is resolved in the cycle of an eternal return...” (Marcuse 167). What he means by this is that there is an extant ideal of an “ought” individual, deemed to be perfect and meant to be a goal for all individuals to achieve. He is stating that this ought individual comes into existence through a constant cycle. This mention of a cycle is actually reminiscent of the Hindu idea of reincarnation, brought into Melville's work in the form of Moby Dick being referred to as Vishnu. Vishnu is the god of destruction, and he symbolizes the idea of reincarnation because destruction is the first step in the cyclic reincarnation process.

Marcuse says on contemporary science, “Nature, scientifically comprehended and mastered, reappears in the technical apparatus of production and destruction which sustains and improves the life of the individuals while subordinating them to the masters of the apparatus” (Marcuse 166). Here he is stating that even the study of nature itself is cyclical. The scientific method reincarnates and destroys ideas, in the form of hypotheses, in the same cyclical way that Ouroboros consumes his own tail. Marcuse is not, however, loading his references with emotion or accusation. He is simply stating the fact that life is cyclical.

Melville heavily references the concept Ouroboros. He spends an entire (although admittedly short) chapter, Chapter 66 – The Shark Massacre, on an image of a wounded and dying shark who frantically consumes his own falling-out intestines “over and over again by the same mouth, to be oppositely voided by the gaping wound” (Melville 320). This scene so blatantly draws on the Ouroboros that ignoring the connection would simply be ignorant. This chapter is also placed directly after an actual philosophical debate regarding the concept of eating a whale's meat by the light of its own oil. Melville almost points a finger at his readers in this debate, saying “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 paté-de-foie-gras” (Melville 318).

Melville's highly emotional tone leads me to believe that the concept of “the universal cannibalism of the sea” is one that he still struggles with, while Marcuse's cold-seeming, resigned, matter-of-fact statements lead me to believe that he has faced the struggle and come to a logical conclusion. I as a reader am left wondering if even the idea of life's cyclical nature can be seen cyclically; would Marcuse lose his composure at some future point in his life? Would Melville eventually come to terms with what he struggles with? Will Ouroboros ever be completely destroyed or completely reborn?

The leviathan and turmoil

The inclusion of the “extracts,” portion in Melville’s “Moby-Dick,” is a seemingly odd way to preface a novel. However as with many other instances in “Moby-Dick,” Melville is directing the reader in a particular direction for which they should analyze the text.

One of the most contentious points surrounding the novel is the meaning or symbolic relevance of Moby-Dick. The entire extracts portion is dedicated to various and differing quotes about whales, almost as if Melville anticipated the numerous interpretations possible.

An interesting quote is included from Lord Bacon, whose philosophies would have intrigued Melville to say the least.

“The great Leviathan that maketh the seas to seethe like boiling pan,” is quoted as Bacon’s version of the psalms.

Similar to Ahab’s view of Moby-Dick, Bacon understands “the leviathan,” as a tormentor of the seas. Ahab called Moby-Dick an evil accursed white whale (Melville 36). In class, the symbolism of Moby-Dick was discussed. For every character Moby-Dick had a different meaning.

Melville’s inclusion of the extracts seems to lend to the chaos surrounding Moby-Dick’s meaning. In Bacon’s quote, the idea is presented that the whale is an antagonist of the seas. One of the points that was presented in class was chapter 54 “The Town ho Story,” in which Ishmael relays a story of Moby-Dick’s ostensible god-like nature. In swallowing up Radney, the argument was made that Moby-Dick was some sort of enforcer of good.

The fact that Ishmael is relaying this story of populist uprising to a group of Peruvian noblemen was perceived as some sort of underhanded jab at the higher classes. However, the final quote of the chapter falls more in line with Bacon’s idea of the whale.

“For all these reasons, then, any way you may look at it, you must needs conclude that the great Leviathan is that one creature in the world which must remain unpainted to the last. True, one portrait may hit the mark much nearer than another, but none can hit it with any very considerable degree of exactness. So there is no earthly way of finding out precisely what the whale really looks like. And the only mode in which you can derive even a tolerable idea of his living contour, is by going a whaling yourself; but by so doing, you run no small risk of being eternally stove and sunk by him. Wherefore, it seems to me you had best not be too fastidious in your curiosity touching this Leviathan.” (Melville 54)

Melville also makes the point that the seas are an inherently chaotic place. The e\image of the self-consuming shark served as a symbol of the seas innate cannibalism. Moby-Dick seems to be a continuation along this same thread. As an inhabitant of the tumultuous seas, Moby Dick is a product of its environment and thus an inherent tormentor.

Melville’s choice of Bacon’s version of the psalms is significant. The original text in which the leviathan is mentioned is Psalm 104 which merely describes it as yet another sea-creature.

“…There the ships go; You formed this leviathan with which to sport. They all look to You with hope, to give their food in its time.” (Psalm 104)

Bacon’s version casts a significantly more disparaging light on the animal, in order to cement its tumultuous nature.

The Depth of Ahab's Derangement

The extracts illuminated different ways to understand certain passages in Moby Dick. One such extracts was

The Larger whales, they seldom venture to attack. They stand in so great dread of some of them, that when out at sea they are afraid to mention even their names, and carry dung, brim-stone, juniper-wood, and some other articles of the same nature in their boats, in order to terrify and prevent their too near approach. (Troil’s).

This allowed the reader to fully understand the depth of Ahab’s obsession with Moby Dick first expressed in chapter 36.

Chapter 36, The Quarter Deck, is Captain Ahab’s first appearance on the Pequod. He starts off by asking seemingly meaningless questions about whaling that gets the crew all riled up, “marveling how it was that they themselves became so excited at such seemingly purposeless questions” (Melville 175). It then comes to light that it was Moby Dick who took of Ahab’s leg, “it was that accursed white whale that razeed me” (Melville 177). Quickly, Ahab gets the crew to agree to search for Moby Dick in order to avenge his own plight, “to chase that white whale…till he spouts black blood” (Melville 177). The crew readily agrees, still caught up in their “eagerness” (Melville 175) to please Ahab. Ahab even offers up a golden doubloon to whoever calls out for Moby Dick. This scene portrays the sole reason Ahab is seeking Moby Dick to be for revenge for the loss of his leg. He is willing to give up a gold doubloon and risk the lives of crew to kill what the cannibals reveal to be a most deadly whale. In the light of just the context of this chapter it is apparent that Ahab is, at the very least, a slightly disturbed man with a fixation on killing the white whale. The full depth of his all-consuming fascination becomes fully understandable with the aid of the extract.

This extract paints the picture of a wary, if not superstitious, whaling crews. It explains that many whaling ships don’t lower for extremely large whales, or whales that are known to be particularly damaging, such as Moby Dick. It also states that many ships even take precautions against the onslaught of such dangerous beasts. The reader is now aware that not every whaling captain holds vendettas against certain whales; in fact most whaling ships avoid such whales that have the destructive ability to cause such vendettas. In this light, Ahab’s mania seems all the more extreme. He differs from the other whaling captains in his capability to see reason. Other captains and crew see the reason behind picking one’s battles and weighing the potential loss over potential gain. Ahab, on the other hand, seeks one thing, and will do anything to attain his goal of killing Moby Dick. The reader is able to understand Ahab’s obsession with a new fire and fury that it didn’t have without the complete sense of how other whalers handle similar situations.

The knowledge this particular extract imparts about how other whalers react to dangerous whales helps inform the reader of the true depth of Ahab’s madness. At the same time, it also solidifies the idea that getting revenge for his lost leg and killing Moby Dick are eternally intertwined and, possibly, that the whole ideal of evil is intertwined with Moby Dick in the possessed mind of Ahab.

The Leviathan

Extract: “The great Leviathan that maketh the seas to seethe like boiling pan” (xli).

In my opinion, the preceding extract is a testimony of Herman Melville’s use of irony throughout the entirety of his novel Moby Dick. In the novel Melville uses irony in his discussions on such topics as race, religion, and class/status. For the sake of this paper, however, I will argue that Melville intended to use irony in his portrayal of Moby Dick and the sea. Many have speculated that Herman Melville intended for Moby Dick to symbolize God or some sort of representation of good and righteousness. My interpretation of Moby Dick’s role stands in stark contrast to these speculations; I believe that the sea and Moby Dick, as the whale is referred to as the Leviathan throughout the novel, represent evil, fear, darkness and punishment. Accordingly, I believe that Melville, ironically and blasphemously, portrays evil in aesthetic light. “The great Leviathan that maketh the seas to seeth like boiling pan” is an extract that alludes to Moby Dick’s role as the gatekeeper of Hell (Satan), as the sea functions as Hell.

It is easy to mistakenly interpret the whale as a symbol for God or good, since Melville frequently associates this creature with great beauty, admiration, mystique, and might; however, Moby Dick is generally associated with evil, fear, and destruction: “Aside from those more obvious considerations touching Moby Dick, which could not but occasionally awaken in any man’s soul some alarm, there was another thought, or rather vague, nameless horror concerning him, which at times by its intensity completely overpowered the rest; and yet so mystical and well nigh ineffable was it, that I almost despair of putting it in a comprehensible form” (Melville, 204). Furthermore, Moby Dick is an aesthetic source of fear and darkness; he is not a good representative of God.

Moby Dick symbolizes Satan, the gatekeeper of Hell, and the sea represents Hell itself. Ironically, Melville uses aesthetic language to describe these dark concepts. For example, Melville frequently describes the beauty and allure of the sea, however, this same sea functions as a place where darkness resides:

Consider the subtleness of the sea; how its most dreaded creatures glide under water, unapparent for the most part, and treacherously hidden beneath the loveliest tints of azure. Consider also the devilish brilliance and beauty of many of its most remorseless tribes, as the dainty embellished shape of many species of sharks. Consider, once more, the universal cannibalism of the sea; all whose creatures prey upon each other, carrying on eternal war since the world began (Melville, 299).

Henceforth, the sea should not be seen as pure and magnificent but as glorified darkness. I believe that Melville, in a sense, places an aesthetic, alluring value upon this darkness yet he still testifies that it is inherently evil.

In our most recent class discussion the majority of the class believed that Moby Dick served to represent God, specifically in the chapter where Radney was eaten by Moby Dick. There was the belief that God (Moby Dick) avenged Steelkilt for Radney’s evils. I disagree with this notion; defiantly, Moby Dick functioned as the gatekeeper of Hell to punish Radney for his sins, “Radney was doomed and made mad” (Melville, 268). Steelkilt, on the other hand, was spared from this punishment as a result of his good-nature. The basis for my belief is the biblical portrayal of the Leviathan—a demonic sea monster that brings wrath; based on Moby Dick’s actions it seems more likely that he, the Leviathan, represents a source of torment and darkness. Additional irony kicks in when it is realized that this source of darkness serves to punish darkness/evil, just as Hell functions to do so. In conclusion, “The great Leviathan that maketh the seas to seeth like boiling pan” is an extract that alludes to Moby Dick’s role as the gatekeeper of Hell, as the sea functions as Hell.

Foreshadowing in Moby Dick

“And whereas all other things, whether beast or vessel, that enter into the dreadful gulf of this monster’s (whale’s) are immediately lost and swallowed up, the sea-gudgeon retires into it in great security, and there sleeps.”

Montaigne. –Apology for Raimond Seabond

Both the literal and assumed figurative meaning of the excerpt above can be applied to Melville’s Moby Dick. Literally, whale hunting was an extremely dangerous occupation, as whalemen faced the constant threat of being devoured or dismembered by a sperm whale. Ishmael states throughout the book that fatalities were always to be expected on ships such as the Pequod as any number of accidents were possible once the boats were lowered for a whale. Figuratively, it is important to note the double meaning of gudgeon. Although it is a name for a small fish, gudgeon is also an archaic term to describe a person who is easily fooled. As foreshadowing has almost certainly showed us that the Pequod and most of her crew will be consumed by their hunt for the White Whale, I believe that this excerpt comes as a warning to men like Ahab, who allow feelings of hate and revenge to guide their entire life, and his crew, who allow themselves to be led down the same dangerous path by their captain.

There is no question throughout the novel that Ahab is consumed by his quest to kill Moby Dick. After Ahab’s speech on the quarter-deck, Ishmael notes, “The White Whale swam before him as the monomaniacal incarnation of all those malicious agencies which some deep men feel eating them…” (200) The first part of the excerpt thus seems to apply especially to Ahab. He enters into the “monster’s” gulf, the monster not simply being the whale, but his all consuming hate and desire for revenge, and is consequently immediately lost to anything that does not help him in his quest. The only thing that keeps him from devoting the entire trip of the Pequod to hunting Moby Dick is his desire to keep the crew from rebelling.

As I stated before, foreshadowing has also led me to believe that his quest will ultimately lead to Ahab being “swallowed up” by the sea. As soon as he recovers from his injury and devotes himself to the hunt, Ahab has almost certainly sealed his fate. I believe that the passages describing Ahab’s “monomaniacal” mission can be seen as foreshadowing his impending demise when these passages are analyzed through the lens of this particular excerpt.

If the first part of the excerpt applies to Ahab, then the second part about the “gudgeon” applies to the crew of the Pequod. Although Ahab may be knowingly “lost” to his mission, the crew may be said to follow him in “with great security.” The crew certainly takes up Ahab’s mission as their own, and Ishmael goes so far as to say that this crew of “mongrel renegades, and castaways, and cannibals” “seemed specially picked and packed by some infernal fatality to help him to his revenge.” (203) Although some among the crew have their own personal experiences with Moby Dick, none have grounds to posses the same hatred for the whale as Ahab. Also, as Starbuck points out, no real financial gain can be made from devoting so much time and energy to hunting Moby Dick. Why then, should the crew, including Ishmael, allow themselves to become so deeply involved in Ahab’s vendetta?

The main reasons seem to be Ahab’s moving performance on the quarter-deck, along with the promise of fame that would come from defeating such an infamous whale. Whatever the reasons, however, most of the crew, with the exception of Ishmael and possibly Starbuck, don’t seem to understand the depth of Ahab’s hate and the drive that motivates his revenge. They take their own shallow enthusiasm and blindly follow their captain as he leads them to almost certain destruction. They follow Ahab into the “monster’s” mouth, however, with a sense of security that is provided by Ahab’s seemingly superior knowledge of the nature of Moby Dick and Ahab’s own contagious enthusiasm for revenge.

Although Ahab may end up in the belly of the beast, so to speak, having fought and been completely destroyed, and the crew may end up in this same place after simply following Ahab and then “sleeping” there, both Ahab and the crew meet their demise by being figuratively eaten by the “monster,” and literally destroyed. Just as the passages about Ahab’s obsession can be seen as foreshadowing his destruction, these passages can also be seen as foreshadowing the demise of the crew. The main difference between them, however, is that Ahab faces this demise of his own free will, while the crew does so under the heavy influence of their captain. This excerpt not only helps point out foreshadowing, but also helps distinguish among the novel’s characters. Ahab is a powerful presence in the story, while few among the crew are ever even mentioned by name. Because Ahab has taken control of his own fate, while the crew has not, Ahab becomes a prominent and important character, while the rest of the crew swim idly by, left to be seen figuratively sleeping as they move towards death.

Oil = Light = Life

In class and for most people that read Moby-Dick a common question comes up all the time. What do the whales represent? To answer this question like we said in class could and is books upon books of materials. I’m not going to argue that whales in the book don’t mean some of the popular answers like God, the path of life, or the unknown. No, I’m here to say that Melville as a fisherman wanted to get a crossed to his readers that whales were like a new version of technology in the time the book was told and their oils brought a great good to the people. In the Extracts Melville put this quote by Fuller’s Profane and Holy State:

“The mighty whales which swim in a sea of water, and have a sea of oil swimming in them.”

I think one reason Melville added this in the Extracts is to call attention to not only the whale’s oil but the size of the whale. Whale oil was discovered to be a great fuel for light and was a major upgrade from using candles as the only source of light that was not the sun. I think people in our time can look past this idea of having little or no source of light. The discovery of whale oil provided the citizens and the whaler’s themselves ironically light. This allowed for more work to be done and the schedule of humans to not only be based on the suns patterns. I’m not trying to simplify the aspect of the whale in Moby-Dick; I’m just trying to bring attention to an angle that I feel is more literal and often overlooked in the great hunt to find the symbolic meaning. Someone had to at least write one entry on the benefits of hunting the whales. Melville’s description of some of the whale dissections can be a little harsh for the PETA members but, he does not mean to come off cruel and neither did the fishermen. Hunting the large whales was a job; a job that if done correctly could bring light back to the people. And with the stronger better glow the whale oil gave off people could in turn b enlightened with knowledge, reading and working later in the night. Although this entry was not the one dealing with Marcuse; I’m sure he would see my last sentence as a terrible thing and in turn would probably hate the idea of whale hunting. That is an argument for another day. I believe Melville saw the whale oil as a great invention, like the internet or something. Finally, candles and all their wax and dim dark light would no longer be the only source of light.

In Moby-Dick Melville’s chapter “The Lamp” helps explain my point that the whale was seen as necessity to kill for its oil so man could see. When the quote above said a sea of oil inside them, I think the point was to man the whale is so large and has so much oil killing it would help their society so much. For what other reason would Melville include a chapter about these oils that fuel lamps that is one if not the shortest chapter in the book. I think the actual shortness of The Lamp is symbolic of how readers, just as they do this chapter, skim over the meaningfulness of the whale oil.

“But the whaleman, as he seeks the food of light, so he lives in light….so that in the pitchiest night the ship’s black hull still houses illumination. He burns, too, the purest oil, in its unmanufactured, and, therefore, unvitiated state; a fluid unknown to solar, lunar, or astral contrivances ashore. He goes and hunts for his oil, so as to be sure of its freshness and genuineness, even as the traveler on the prairie hunts up his own supper of game.”

With the whale oil burning so bright and lasting so long it can guide the massive ship through the night on its voyage to get more oil. The last sentence of my quote, which is also the last sentence in the chapter, is the most important and powerful in my eyes. Melville says that a travel in the prairie that needs to hunt his own food whether it is deer, squirrel, or bird needs to hunt the animal for food. The traveler needs the food to sub stain life for not only himself but his family. Melville compares this needed of game for survival to that of the need for oil by a whaleman. This was actually shocking to me when I first read it. He is saying that in a whaleman’s eyes the whale oil is like supper. So in that thinking a whaleman would give up supper for light. I’m not saying this is wrong or right, I just wanted to bring this topic to the surface. The whaleman like Captain Ahab would give anything for the capture of the right whale. The whaleman seeks the food of light, as if it could sub stain life. I find his most interesting that Melville described them like this and makes me wonder if this was how it really was. They voyage on these ships knowing that the chances are already against them for survival, but the ships are always full. I believe that this is a way of Melville showing how important the oil was to not only society but the actual whaleman themselves. It may seem selfish, what some of the men do like Ahab, but I respect their drive to achieve what they sent out to do. Though Ahab’s case is very extreme, I feel the thousands of other whale ship captains and their crews set out to sea trying to get that oil. And maybe it was for them and the captain to feel good but the reality of it all is that the oil helped society in America. It brought light ashore and for that I respect each and every whaleman.

The Whale Jesus Christ

In the chapter “The Pequod meets the Virgin”, both the Pequod and the Virgin compete to kill the jaundiced old bull sperm whale. When a pod of whales traveled past the two ships the old bull was slowly trailing behind the rest due to a stump of a fin and a sickness he displayed. From the first time reading this chapter you would suspect that it was just about the obviously stated but after reading the following quote from Moby Dick’s extracts it made me think differently.

"The aorta of a whale is larger in the bore than the main pipe of the water-works at London Bridge, and the water roaring in its passage through that pipe is inferior in impetus and velocity to the blood gushing from the whale's heart." —PALEY'S THEOLOGY.

After thinking about this quote and noticing that it is from a book of theology, this caused me to think of this whale and scene of the book in a deeper, more meaningful way. As Moby Dick represents God Himself, I believe this whale represents Jesus Christ. I reread the chapter and caught on to small details that help support my conclusion.

Going in order from the beginning of the chapter I will describe what I noticed. First they described the whale as being “afflicted with the jaundice, or some other infirmity” (385). These to me have double meanings for the whale. Yes, he is seen as weak and inflicted with disease that causes jaundice, but these could also represent the whale in a religious way. Jaundice also means distorted judgment. The men of the Pequod and the Virgin are seeing him as a stupid old whale that is an easy kill because of his ailments but the whale really is Jesus Christ who is willing to sacrifice himself to save the rest of his pod. This also goes along with infirmity where infirmity can mean moral weakness. The sacrificing of himself because he feels like he morally has to, showing his moral weakness to the pod.

Some other small instances I noticed as I was rereading the chapter includes when they described the whale as carrying “the everlasting mail” (389). In Christianity Jesus is more or less the messenger to God. You must go through Jesus first and he will deliver you to God, that Jesus’ everlasting mail is the people who want to reach Him. Another small reference that made the whale be more Jesus-like is after the whale was struck by the three harpoons and was suspended to three bits of board. The whale was just dangling from the iron as he knew he had to sacrifice himself. The way it was worded in the novel just brought the image of Jesus Christ as he was suspended by just a few nails on some board during his crucifixion.

Although Jesus’ life in the mortal world was taken from him during his crucifixion, his eternal life would carry on. “His life, as they significantly call it, was untouched” is a statement from the novel that is directed at the whale at hand and gives him Jesus-like qualities (391). The whale now is seen as being invincible even if his life on this earth is taken away from him, because we know he will carry on afterwards.

With help from the quoted extract, I believe the last stroke on the whale to be at his heart due to the immense velocity the blood was spraying out. When Flask struck him there the whale began “spouting thick blood, with swift fury blindly darted at the craft, bespattering them and their glorying crews all over with showers of gore, capsizing Flask's boat and marring the bows” (391). I think since the whale has such a large heart, that the flow of its blood is more powerful than that of the water flowing to London bridge, shows alone the power the whale has and makes it a sacred creature, making this individual whale more like Jesus Christ. Also the showering of the men and the boat is the washing away of their sins. Jesus shed his blood to wash away our sins, just like this whale is shedding his blood and showering the crew to wash away their sins. After this, the whale began to sink, which is an unusual thing for a sperm whale. But it is said that when the whales sink they always rise back up more buoyant than life, this again relates to Jesus. After he died and was resurrected three days later, and was literally more buoyant than life.

There were other small hints that were brought to my attention after reading the quoted extract that should have made the reader believe this incident was more than just the obviously stated and that it had a deep religious meaning to it. One was that the whale was said to be “holding mad Christmas in him” (386). With Christmas being the day Jesus was born. Another hint was “May of life”, alluding to Jesus’ resurrection (393). Also the use of threes in this chapter are prominent, which in the Christian religion is significant, especially while dealing with Jesus Christ, for example; three boards, three mates that killed him, and the three boats (or phantoms) that surrounded the whale. Another is the Virgin, which could hint to the Virgin Mary. So yes, this is scene of a whale hunt but it has symbolic meaning for Christianity, especially with the whale representing Jesus Christ.


Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick. New York: Penguin Group, 1992.

Elijah as Truth

In the bible, Elijah and Ahab are constantly in conflict. Ahab is the most evil of the kings of Israel, guided by greed and deceit (such as in his pursuit of the greatest vineyard after acquiring another through murder). The two contradict each other in the eyes of God — Ahab is evil whereas Elijah is good and faithful; Ahab is concerned only with his own acquisitions whereas Elijah is concerned with his fellow humanity (such as when he asks God to revive the widow’s son who fed him when he was starving). Based upon their biblical roles, Melville manipulates the relationship between Captain Ahab and Elijah in Moby Dick. I will demonstrate in my the following discussion that Melville introduces Elijah as the seemingly insane bum to instill the questioning of Ahab’s authority and, through a reading of Marcuse’s One Dimensional Man, that Elijah’s warning to Ishmael is the representation of the loss of liberty to labor under a capitalist authoritarianism.
Elijah’s role in the novel is brief; he enters in the earlier chapters when he lurks behind Ishmael and Queequeg as they walk down the street, sends them his warnings and disappears for the rest of the novel (Stubb makes a reference to the biblical Elijah’s ascendence later on in the novel when criticizing Fleece’s lack of cooking skills, but I will not include this segment in my discussion). After Elijah’s initial warnings, he only regains a presence in two later spots, both of which revolve around the sense of mystery surrounding Captain Ahab’s rule of the ship. The first is directly before Ahab’s first appearance upon the deck; he has remained hidden from the sailors below deck since before the Pequod set sail, “Every time I ascended to the deck from my watches below, I instantly gazed aft to mark if any strange face were visible; for my first vague disquietude touching the unknown captain, now in the seclusion of the sea, became almost a perturbation. This was strangely heightened at times by the ragged Elijah's diabolical incoherences uninvitedly recurring to me, with a subtle energy I could not have before conceived of” (Melville Ch. 28). The second occurrence comes after Ahab’s unseen sailors yield to his call in pursuit of the first whale of the expedition, “Though the affair still left abundant room for all manner of wild conjectures as to dark Ahab's precise agency in the matter from the beginning. For me, I silently recalled the mysterious shadows I had seen creeping on board the Pequod during the dim Nantucket dawn, as well as the enigmatical hintings of the unaccountable Elijah” (Melville Ch. 48). In both cases, Elijah’s role is within Ishmael’s memory, and he continues to hint at the dark mystery in the vast unknowns aboard Ahab’s ship; he hints at evil.
When Ishmael first hears of Ahab from Captain Peleg, he attempts to describe him while producing the effect of intimidation, yet trust. His result is a stream of contradicting, exaggerated and vague statements about who the captain is.
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 the 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! (Melville Ch. 16)
In terms of Marcuse, this passage is essentially one of lies. “This language controls by reducing the linguistic forms and symbols of reflection, abstraction, development, contradiction; by substituting images for concepts. It denies or absorbs the transcendent vocabulary; it does not search for but establishes and imposes truth and falsehood” (Marcuse Ch. 4).
If Ahab is the evil king, and his fellow captains acting in evil on his behalf, than Elijah is truth. He warns of the painstaking labors that Ahab will force upon his crew, of the greed and lies. “But you must jump when he gives an order. Step and growl; growl and go—that's the word with Captain Ahab. But nothing about that thing that happened to him off Cape Horn, long ago, when he lay like dead for three days and nights; nothing about that deadly skrimmage with the Spaniard afore the altar in Santa?—heard nothing about that, eh? Nothing about the silver calabash he spat into? And nothing about his losing his leg last voyage, according to the prophecy. Didn't ye hear a word about them matters and something more, eh? No, I don't think ye did” (Melville Ch. 19). Before Elijah, the deceitful language of the captains effectively prevented any questioning of Ahab’s character or ability to captain a whaling ship. They manipulated the listener (Ishmael) to believe that it was inherently sinful to doubt at all the honor of such a man of glory. But Elijah steps in as if to remind Ishmael that the truth lies beneath the decks of the ship, where he will be forced throughout the whole journey to fall slave to the man who plans the journey of his ship as the pathway towards his own greedy pursuit — the white whale. Elijah does not try to convince Ishmael of his own goodness, but instead calls attention to the deceit he has been victim to.

Insert section about Marcuse’s opinion of labor and the capitalistic venture of the shit and the authoritarian power of Ahab, and how Elijah’s warnings relate to this.

Elijah is the reminder of the blinders one wears even in great decisions. He is the presentation of truth and the power — or weakness — of the individual in the face of (the king of) evil — of power, greed and deceit.

Thinking Abstractly Through Pip

After reading chapter 93 regarding Pip, I began to wonder what the reason for this character was in the novel. What is the importance of the event that occurred to Pip as well as his overall existence? As I delved into the matter, I found a possible reason of why Melville included and used such a character: Pip is used to get the reader thinking abstractly through him being a contrast to Ahab as well as an embodiment or example for certain symbols.

Pip is the opposite of Ahab in many aspects. Pip is very lively and friendly with everyone and he is constantly in a good mood. Pip seems to be in high spirits and dancing around with his tambourine up until his incident with falling into the ocean. “jolly brightness peculiar to his tribe; a tribe, which ever enjoy all holidays and festivities with finer, freer relish than any other race. For blacks, the year's calendar should show naught but three hundred and sixty-five Fourth of Julys and New Year's Days” (Chap 93). Ahab, on the other hand, is very isolated and is constantly in a negative and brooding mood. He is always angry, revengeful, and snappy at the crew members.

Pip has also refused to become a victim of Ahab’s persuasion. He is not a follower for the hunting of Moby Dick; he is afraid of the white whale and the possible outcome of hunting it. As Pip states in Chapter 40, “Here have I heard all their chat just now, and the white whale – but spoken of once! And only this evening – it makes me jingle all over like my tambourine – that anaconda of an old man swore ‘em in to hunt him! Oh, thou big white God aloft there somewhere in yon darkness, have mercy on this small black boy down here”. In the end, this could show the power that Ahab had on the futures of everyone, even those who did not follow him since the whole crew, excluding Ishmael, ultimately perishes.

Ahab has also been described as immovable. Pip is obviously the opposite with this after going from happy and lively to crazy following his episode. Ahab is an individualist and enjoys being solitary where Pip went crazy because of being alone. Ahab and Pip are both crazy but in different ways. Ahab is hungry for revenge and will do anything to succeed at it. Even though Pip does go crazy and might scare people, he does not push away the crew members like Ahab does. Pip is crazy in a way where he is not making much sense to other people as seen in chapter 99 where he talks grammar, “I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look”. But the curious thing is, later on in the chapter, he talks of and predicts the destruction of the Pequod, “when they come to fish up this old mast, and find a doubloon lodged in it”. How could one that is seen as insane and nonsensical be so deep in thought and correctly predict the future?

The incidence regarding Pip can also show the effect of isolation. Pip did not suffer due to the dangers of being in the ocean like sharks or drowning, instead he suffered because of the loneliness and isolation. “But the awful loneliness is intolerable. The intense concentration of self in the middle of such a heartless immensity, my God! Who can tell it?”(Chap 93). I discussed this in my last blog post where it is mentioned that Melville believed in the importance of relationships and the human community. He also believed that individualism would lead to one’s demise, which he portrays through both Ahab’s overall behavior and Pip’s state of mind.

The effect of the sea can also be seen through Pip’s experience. The sea could symbolize, as mentioned in class, chaos, death, and destruction. Pip did not physically die from the sea, but his soul did. This could have been because Pip became aware of the chaos and destruction in the world. Pip then became more inward and thoughtful as it is mentioned that he saw the “unwarped primal world” and was probably able to compare it to modern times and life on the ship. It is almost like a child who grew up and realized what the world is really like. Ishmael mentions that Pip becomes wise especially when it comes to God and religion, even though the crew calls him crazy, “So man's insanity is heaven's sense; and wandering from all mortal reason, man comes at last to that celestial thought, which, to reason, is absurd and frantic” (Chap 93). So, in one sense or point of view, he is crazy where in another, he is thoughtful and sensible.

Whaling is a Way of Life

While reading through the Extracts at the beginning of Moby Dick, I felt like the quotes all said pretty much the same thing: whales are big and strong. Whales are smelly and have large body parts. One particular quote caught my eye:

“And pray, sir, what in the world is equal to it?”
-Edmund Burke’s reference in Parliament to the Nantucket Whale-Fishery (xiv)

Unlike the majority of the other quotes, this one does not explicitly have the word “whale” in it. Instead, I believe this quote refers to the process of whaling itself, and more specifically the catching of the great Moby Dick. Understanding the meaning of this quote helps the reader to become more aware of what whaling means to each member of the Pequod. Each person is on board that whaling ship for different reasons. For example, the narrator Ishmael seemed to use the sea as an escape from his boring, methodical world. In the very beginning of the novel, Ishmael says he decided to become a whaler because he had no money and nothing on land was all that intriguing to him anyway. He even goes so far as to say whaling and a life on the sea is his “substitute for pistol and ball” (3). All throughout the plot Ishmael seems to at least accept if not love his time at sea. Whaling started out as an adventure for him, but in the end (perhaps through Starbuck’s influence) Ishmael seems to be more interested in the monetary gains by capturing Moby Dick. An almost direct answer to Edmund Burke’s above question seems to be given by Ishmael in chapter 24 The Advocate: “Here I prospectively ascribe all the honor and the glory to whaling; for a whale-ship was my Yale College and my Harvard” (122). I think here Ishmael means that some men get their educations through paper degrees, but sailors like Ishmael can get much more valuable experience and acquire greater knowledge through whaling. And in reference to the Extracts quote, no education can equal that given to a whaler.

To Ahab, whaling is basically a complete opposite compared to what it means for Ishmael. Ahab considers Moby Dick to be the root of all evil. He makes finding and killing the whale who took his leg his one and only priority. His life as a whaler is consumed by his vengeance for Moby Dick. What whaling means to Ahab is shown in chapter 36 when he officially addresses the crew for the first time, saying:

“It was Moby Dick that dismasted me; Moby Dick that brought me to this dead stump I stand on now… Aye, aye! It was that accursed white whale that razed me; made a poor pegging lubber of me for ever and a day!...Aye, aye! And I’ll chase him round Good Hope, and round the Horn, and round the Norway Maelstrom, and round perdition’s flames before I give him up. And this is what ye have shipped for, men! To chase that white whale on both sides of land, and over all sides of earth, till he spouts black blood and rolls fin out” (177).

By reading the quote from the Excerpts, it is easier to understand what whaling means to Ahab. Ahab will never be able to take revenge on Moby Dick unless he captures Moby Dick. Whaling consumes him, and consequently whaling and the pursuit of Moby Dick actually IS Ahab’s life.

Ahab’s first, second, and third mates Starbuck, Stubb, and Flask seem to just prefer life on the sea over life on land. Starbuck is driven by his faith and money. He sees whaling and the pursuit of Moby Dick as his profession, and wants the capital gains. Stubb takes whatever the sea throws at him with a smile and accepts life for what it is. Just as with Starbuck, whaling is a way of life for Stubb. Flask is the most adventurous of the three mates, and enjoys pursuing the whales the most. What these three whalers have in common is one thing: they are all active crewmembers of The Pequod. The Extracts quote asks: what could equal a career of whaling? The novel Moby Dick answers this question: nothing. This is shown through Ahab returning to find Moby Dick, Starbuck, Stubb, and Flask remaining mates under an unemotional and vengeful captain, and even Ishmael writing an entire novel on whaling. While the life of a whaler might not be luxurious, all of these men can’t help but return to the sea, or at least spend a large chunk of time writing about it. The sea and whales have consumed each and every one of them, thus becoming their world.

Polymania

Herman Melville’s Moby Dick is regarded in some circles as the culminating masterpiece in his repertoire of whaling memoirs. Drawing upon the history and fiction of other whaling literature, Melville incorporates the knowledge and points of view of hundreds of authors before him. But these references do not act as mere quotations within Melville’s novel; each holds its own importance in directing the reader on how to interpret the complexities of Moby Dick. One such quotation taken from Richard Strafford’s letter from the Bermudas begs the reader to call into question and examine the motives of the voyage of the Pequod ; that it was not driven by the “monomania” of Ahab, but the collective madness held by each man of the crew.

In his letter Strafford states, “Myself have agreed to try whether I can master and kill this Sperma-ceti whale, for I could never hear of any of that sort that was killed by any man.” While this quotation is most readily and easily applied to Ahab’s mission to capture his foe, it is important to remember that these excerpts must also hold importance for Ishmael and the rest of the crew as it is told from his point of view. When analyzing Strafford’s statement as something of great importance to the entire crew (as it should be), we may interpret that each whaler aboard the Pequod was filled with the same ambition to capture what no man before had been able to, an impossibility that was both understood and embraced. With the knowledge of an almost guaranteed failure there of course comes the question as to why the crew agreed to set out on the voyage in the first place, the answer to which lies within the circumstances by which they were drawn to whaling. As “a crew…chiefly made up of mongrel renegades, and castaways, and cannibals” (Melville 197), these men clearly had nothing left for them on shore. Joining the crew of the Pequod was without doubt an act of desperation as it was widely known that the life of a whaler wasn’t an entirely pleasant one, but the decision was nonetheless made by each crew member because it provided them with a purpose they lacked ashore.

In this way, every man was driven by the same madness that is usually uniquely identified with Captain Ahab. It was not that “at times his hate seemed almost theirs” (197) but that this hate of the whale was the hate of the entire crew. Though the source of the mania in every case was not the revenge sought by Ahab, it was the same obsession mentioned by Strafford to complete what those before them could not achieve and it was a desire to prove themselves in ways they were incapable during their lives on land. The knowledge of past failures and the high improbability of success was no deterrent for this crew or any crew like theirs, it was conversely their motivation. And while the motivation to complete the Pequod’s mission was full of tenacity throughout the entirety of the voyage, it was its non-unified and delirious nature that caused the journey to repeat the failures of their predecessors.

In part of his narration of the voyage, Ishmael states “nor is the history of fanatics half so striking in respect to the measureless self-deception of the fanatic himself” (336), admitting for himself and the rest of the crew that their voyage was driven by a misguided fanaticism. Although the crew members were indeed motivated to capture the illusive whale, they were guided to do so by a force so deceptive that it doomed their success from the very beginning. Though truly mad with the desire to find acceptance and prove their worth, the whalers were fooled by their own minds into thinking the objective solely fell to capturing the White Whale. As Ishmael later remarks, “human madness is oftentimes a cunning and most feline thing” (196) that completely consumed and encompassed the crew so that their means to reach their final objective ultimately became their strongest inhibitor, destining them for the same failure they were trying to overcome.

Although each ultimately desired to achieve the same goal, their individual insanities rendered them incapable of combining their efforts to aid one another in succeeding. The individual gain of self-worth, revenge, or even money for each crew member eventually came to outweigh the sum of the crew effort, making the attainment of the final objective impossible. Though the voyage of the Pequod is most popularly identified with Ahab’s purposes of seeking revenge, Richard Strafford’s quote shows us that a similar mania was alive within the souls of every crew member aboard the ship. It is essential to weigh the motives of every whaler with equal significance to those of Ahab’s in order to fully understand the failures of the Pequod’s voyage.

Malcusevillle

I sat down to write this knowing full well if I gave him a chance, Marcuse would rear his head in Melville like Moby Dick does in, well, Moby Dick. It didn’t take but one page of the introduction of the One-Dimensional Man for my hull to be filled with the perfume of rich sperm oil; I was convinced Marcuse had read Moby Dick and chuckled at Melville’s (perhaps unconscious) portrayal of the Machine. Let us gather in the mast-head with Marcuse (who is not so whimsical and absent-minded as those Platonists) to look down at the happenings of the Pequod. He reads aloud:

“If we attempt to relate the causes of the danger to the way in which society is organized and organizes its member, we are immediately confronted with the fact that advanced industrial society becomes richer, bigger, and better as it perpetuates the danger” (Marcuse ix).
This is one of my most-thought-about quotes from One-Dimensional Man because it is so utterly applicable. Let me try to explain its application thus, with a scenario. Cue war-drums:

The Machine is off to battle, or at least preparing to be. Not one of the citizens knows the military objections or the “plan” but that is acceptable – they don’t need to know. Factories churn out soldiers and arms alike, the I.S. curve is slammed into the right most corner of the plane, consumption and output are allowed to swell, and none are any the wiser; the masses are sated with their crumbs. Politicians and stock-holders alike revel in the subtle dominance they utilize. Sure, a few idealists realize the propaganda for what it is, but they cannot deny the revenue this mess is bringing in.
As bombs roll off the conveyor-belts, enthusiastic, middle-class warriors paint symbols of intimidation on their steely shells. Imagine, instead of the menacing sneer of a shark, the missiles are white-washed and painted with the wrinkled visage of a great leviathan that stares coldly from its tonnage at the progress it has mechanized.

Insert paragraph about the technological miracle that is the whaling ship and link it to the instumentalization of the crew and the Machine.

Let us also comment on Melville’s incorporation of Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish1. If we familiarize ourselves with the further discussion of his concept, we see whaling is but a simple example of the real point. Sure, this idea is an accepted rule of the industry, but look at his examples. “What are the sinews and souls of Russian serfs and Republican slaves but Fast-Fish, whereof possession is the whole of the law? … What was Poland to the Czar? … What India to England? What at last will Mexico be the United States? All Loose-Fish.” Melville is capturing the spirit of Imperialism – the way in which people are treated like resources and land is a war-trophy. Immediately following this, we see Marcuse in full. “What are the Rights of Man and the Liberties of the World but Loose-Fish? What all men’s minds and opinions but Loose-Fish?” (Melville 359). If we assume that liberties are Loose-Fish, then we see the results of such in Marcuse – “liberties can be made into a powerful instrument of domination” (Marcuse 7).

To draw the lines between the two theories, we can see Ahab’s use of the crew’s minds and needs to pull them into his magnetic mission. He has removed them from their initial goals of just whaling and made them hunt for his Moby-Dick. Ahab has stupefied his audience, and once accomplishing that, he seeks way s in which to keep them submissive. Marcuse would argue that the crew is fully convinced that the struggle of Ahab has become theirs. But we don’t need Marcuse to know that; Ishmael’s narrative says it all; “My soul is more than matched; she’s overmanned; and by a madman! … I think I see his impious end; but feel I must help him to it” (Melville 162). Ahab has done his part well; he has calculated the “optimal utilization” of his men; he has calculated his resources (Marcuse 6).

A tangent. Marcuse states that servitude is only an object when the consciousness of servitude is present (Marcuse 7). Ishmael has realized that Ahab has him by his gizzard. So then, how is that Ishmael is forced to serve under him still? Isn’t his liberation of such suffering undone by his coming-to? Why does he say “I have no key to life again”? Enter Marcuse. Domination is efficiently used by “gradually replacing personal dependence… with the dependence on the ‘objective order of things…” (Marcuse 144). Ishmael (and the mates) knows the status-quo and the cost of a failed rebellion. Mutiny is not something to be taken lightly. Marcuse is defines this relationship by calling the defense structure a means to perpetuate a sense of vulnerability that the machine cures by mass-producing bombs.
To what end, then? Well we see that Ahab and his crew are obliterated and that Ishmael is left with a coffin and a story. Marcuse says that we die rationally – and so Ahab dragged his ship to the depths of the sea for his ideology. This was not unforeseen. The vast amount of foreshadowing in the novel made it apparent that the end was bleak; “reveal[ed] it as a rigged game” (Marcuse 257).





1 Melville states: “I. A Fast-Fish belongs to the party fast to it. II. A Loose-Fish is fair game for anybody who can soonest catch it” (Melville 357).

Melville Prompts #2

Note 1:  Pick one "minor" character in Moby-Dick.  Ishmael, Queequeg, and Ahab are off limits, as are Stubb and Starbuck.  Good options include Fedallah, Tashtego, Bulkington, and Pip.  First, carefully search through the text to make sure that you know all places where your character appears.  Use an etext to make life easy!  Here's the link.  Conduct an analysis of the role of that character in the novel through this week's reading, focusing on a single, clear argument.  You might, optionally, include outside research. For instance, you might argue that Tashtego's behavior in the novel has something to do with the history of his tribe.  Focus on one or more specific passages!


Note 2:  Skim through the entirety of the extracts at the beginning of the novel.  After picking a single quotation which interests you, present an argument for how some aspect of the novel (including, again, at least one cited passages) should be read differently, given what that extract shows us about Melville's purposes or intentions.


Notes 3:  Use Marcuse to read Melville.  You need to have an argument, and to cite both authors.  Other than that, the details are up to you.