My List (What to Read Next)

OK, I've come up with a list of authors/titles that I would like to read, but might not without some extra motivation. It's random and off the top of my head, so I'm sure there are other things I would enjoy that I've left off. And it's slanted pretty heavily toward the 20th century. I'm going to put the actual list as a comment so you can come up with your own before seeing mine and being influenced by it. And then add yours as another comment, of course.

Arr! Is that the weathered Pequod coasting into harbor?

So, what's next? Is anyone interested in turning this into a real book club? Here are my votes. Tell me what you want.

• Henry V (for Shakespeare in the Park)
• LotR Trilogy
• The Hobbit
• One of those Jane Austen books or other 'classics'

Redbeard, 89-117

We just had the MD post-reading discussion at the delicious Jazz: A Louisiana Kitchen. Strawberry Fist, Her Grace, Her Grace's husband (who will now be referred to as His Grace), Her Grace's mom, Kelly, and I were all in attendance. In this post and the next one, I will finish my notes from this reading of Moby Dick.

From Chapter 89 - Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish:

"A Loose-Fish is fair game for anybody who can soonest catch it." "..What at last will Mexico be to the United States? All Loose-Fish"
I thought this was an interesting point of view. You've got to remember that in 1851, the US was acquiring territory and new states pretty regularly. I wonder if we will eventually incorporate Mexico, too.

From Chapter 90 - Heads or Tails:

"Ye tail is ye Queen's, that ye Queen's wardrobe may be supplied with ye whalebone". Now this was written at a time when the black limber bone of the Greenland or Right whale was largely used in ladies' bodices."
The things women do for fashion. Imagine getting into one of these things and having your chambermaid lace you up. In order to have the 'perfect' figure, you would be subject to anything from fainting fits to miscarriage.

From Chapter 93 - The Castaway:

"So, though in the clear air of day, suspended against a blue-veined neck, the pure-watered diamond drop will healthful glow; yet, when the cunning jeweller would show you the diamond in its most impressive lustre, he lays it against a gloomy ground, and then lights it up, not by the sun, but by some unnatural gases. Then come out those fiery effulgences, infernally superb; then the evil-blazing diamond, once the divinest symbol of the crystal skies, looks like some crown- jewel stolen from the King of Hell."

This is still the case today. Diamonds do look more fiery in flourescent light, even those of poor quality. Melville has taught us budding jewelry-buyers something useful. Make sure you view your gems, diamonds in particular, in natural light before you buy it. Diamonds of lower color quality (like yellow) are often placed under slightly blue fluorescence to make them look whiter.

And fluorescing diamonds do look very cool (like crown-jewels stolen from the King of Hell) under blacklights. Like a white shirt at a dance club.

From Chapter 96 - The Try-Works:

"Wrapped, for that interval, in darkness myself, I but the better saw the redness, the madness, the ghastliness of others. The continual sight of the fiend shapes before me, capering half in smoke and half in fire, these at last begat kindred visions in my soul.."

When I read this passage, I thought of Plato's Allegory of the Cave. All of those shadows on the cave wall.. However frightening they are to you, if it's all you know, then there's some comfort in it. Not an exact parallel, I know, but a tangent.

From Chapter 109 - Ahab and Starbuck in the Cabin:

"Let the owners stand on Nantucket beach and outyell the Typhoons. What cares Ahab?"

Haven't we all felt this way about the people in charge of us at times? I know I have. And what a good way to put it, Ahab.

From Chapter 113 - The Forge:

"No, no - no water for that; I want it of the true death-temper. Ahoy, there! Tashtego, Queequeg, Daggoo! What say ye, pagans! Will ye give me as much blood as will cover this barb?" holding it high up. A cluster of dark nods replied, Yes. Three punctures were made in the heathen flesh, and the White Whale's barbs were then tempered.

"Ego non baptizo te in nomine patris, sed in nomine diaboli!" deliriously howled Ahab, as the malignant iron scorchingly devoured the baptismal blood.

This is a wonderfully devilish scene. I'd like to use some of it for a d+d cutscene. There seem to be a lot of rituals to dark gods, and, since I've never actually seen one, it's nice to have good visual ideas to draw on. And, the translated latin: I do not baptize you upon the name of the Father, but upon the name of the devil! Scary.

From Chapter 117 - The Whale-Watch:

"Take another pledge, old man, said the Parsee, as his eyes lighted up like fire-flies in the gloom, - Hemp only can kill thee."

How is it that Fedallah can give these sort of predictions? And how is it that he's actually right? Does he cast auguries or something? I love the sort of mysticism that Melville gives him. I'm sure it's a form of Orientalism, the idea of the other, that was so prevalent during the time in Europe. Melville gives these attributes to Fedallah, and the awe of him to the rest of the crew.

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Redbeard, 79-84

I'm trying to get all of my posting done by the big showdown on Sunday. Here's a bit more.

From Chapter 79 - The Praire:

"Human or animal, the mystical brow is as that great golden seal affixed by the German emperors to their decrees. It signifies "God: done this day by my hand".

I love the idea of that passage. I wish people were as forthright about the things they did as Melville alludes to. Sort of like, "my word is my bond" or closing a deal by a handshake. Personal ethics and accountability are things that I place a high value on, and you can be sure that if I tell you I'll do something, it will be done.

From Chapter 81 - The Pequod meets the Virgin:

"I tell ye what it is, men" - cried Stubb to his crew - "It's against my religion to get mad; but I'd like to eat that villanous Yarman - Pull - won't ye?"

Stubb would be a fun guy to get drunk with. What sort of person even thinks of something like this, lets alone says it? Hilarious.

"Oh! won't ye pull for your duff, my lads - such a sog! such a sogger! Don't ye love sperm?"

I know I'm taking this line completely out of context, but.. *snicker*


From Chapter 82 - The Honor and Glory of Whaling:

"..that famous story of St. George and the Dragon; which dragon I maintain to have been a whale; for in many old chronicles whales and dragons are strangely jumbled together, and often stand for each other. "Thou art as a lion of the waters, and as a dragon of the sea.."

That picture on the right is St George and the Dragon, by Rogier van der Weyden (1432). I don't know about you, but this myth must have been really corrupted by this time if it really referred to a whale, instead of a dragon.

I will say this to back up Melville's theory. There is a work at the Nelson that is supposed to depict lions, but since the artist (sculptor) had never seen lions, they came out looking like giant rats.

From Chapter 84 - Pitchpoling:

"Queequeg believed strongly in anointing his boat, and one morning not long after the German ship Jungfrau disappeared, took more than customary pains in that occupation; crawling under its bottom, where it hung over the side, and rubbing in the unctuousness as though diligently seeking to insure a crop of hair from the craft's bald keel."

When you read this, what did you think? Was he actually swimming under the ship and rubbing oil in? Or did he do it from one of the smaller boats?


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The goal of the chase, illustrated

Ishmael's and Ahab's quests are different, but similar. Both chase meaning, both are driven by what they don't know and feel they must try to understand. Ahab's just more pissed off about it. Ok, maybe that's a bit simplistic, but there is the idea that if only we could hitch a ride on the whale...or at least what the whale represents--particularly a unique, mysterious, genius whale, we could ride to the bottom of the ocean and back and out, up into the stars, and the ungraspable phantom of life would be a bit more graspable.

Beth Schultz chose this Rockwell Kent illustration as the graphic for her "Unpainted to the Last" exhibit poster in 1995 (that cooresponded with her book of American Art inspired by the M-D). In the Kent illustrated edition, this graphic is in the "Moby Dick" chapter, but I always think that it illustrates the following quote (from Of Whales in Paint; in Teeth; in Wood; in Sheet-Iron; in Stone; in Mountains; in Stars.)

"Thus at the North have I chased Leviathan round and round the Pole with the revolutions of the bright points that first defined him to me. And beneath the effulgent Antarctic skies I have boarded the Argo-Navis, and joined the chase against the starry Cetus far beyond the utmost stretch of Hydrus and the Flying Fish. With a frigate's anchors for my bridle-bitts and fasces of harpoons for spurs, would I could mount that whale and leap the topmost skies, to see whether the fabled heavens with all their countless tents really lie encamped beyond my mortal sight!"

A nice collection of Kent's M-D illustrations are available at the Plattsburgh State Art Museum Web site in celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Kent illustrated edition of M-D.

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Surfacing

I took a few days off to go to my niece's third birthday party. She lives in NY (like our buddy H.M. once did) so on the trip there and back, I had a lot of airport hours to enjoy M-D...here are some of the notes I scribbled as I drank Starbucks coffee, listened to my ipod, and read my favorite book... I omitted some of the quotes that Scott also highlighted, but I also love the Town-Ho story and the comment about the story of M-D being too long a story...

What is meaning, and what do we know?
Yeah, yeah, I know that Descartes covered this, and The Matrix made it popular, but that doesn't mean we have a good answer, or that Melville's questions aren't relevant. The whale lives below the surface, below the world we can see and comprehend, and therefore is all the more mysterious and alluring to us. But as Ishmael explains, the world above the surface alludes us as well.

From The Fountain "...in this world it is not so easy to settle these plain things. I have ever found your plain things the knottiest of all. And as for this whale spout, you might almost stand in it, and yet be undecided as to what it is precisely."

Cannibals and Caretakers, all
I love the constant reminders that we humans are very much part of the natural world, and the natural world is very much us. We are all cannibals. The whaling business is a cannibalistic enterprise. We are also caretakers. In The Grand Armada, when they encounter the pod of nursing and pregnant whales, Queequeg pats the baby whale on the head. Starbuck scratches their backs with his lance. The objects of death are the same objects of affection. The person who wants to kill you might also be your buddy. There is no inherent meaning...only context and contrast. "...there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself."

"It is also very curiously displayed in the side fin, the bones of which almost exactly answer to the bones of the human hand, minus only the thumb. This fin has four regular bone-fingers, the index, middle, ring, and little finger. But all these are permanently lodged in their fleshy covering, as the human fingers in an artificial covering."

"I myself am a savage, owning no allegiance but to the King of the Cannibals; and ready at any moment to rebel against him." Woo hoo!

More from The Grand Armada "...and as human infants while suckling will calmly and fixedly gaze away from the breast, as if leading two different lives at the time; and while yet drawing mortal nourishment, be still spiritually feasting upon some unearthly reminiscence;--even so did the young of these whales seem looking uptowards us, but not at us, as if we were but a bit of Gulfweed in their new-born sight. Floating on their sides, the mothers also seemed quietly eyeing us. One of these little infants, that from certain queer tokens seemed hardly a day old, might have measured some fourteen feet in length, and some six feet in girth. He was a little frisky; though as yet his body seemed scarce yet recovered from that irksome position it had so lately occupied in the maternal reticule; where, tail to head, and all ready for the final spring, the unborn whale lies bent like a Tartar's bow. The delicate side-fins, and the palms of his flukes, still freshly retained the plaited crumpled appearance of a baby's ears newly arrived from foreign parts."

My favorite title of a chapter: "Of Whales in Paint; in Teeth; in Wood; in Sheet Iron; in Stone; in Mountains; in Stars"

A few of my favorite quotes that I revisit like old friends each time I read this:

From Brit: "that however baby man may brag of his science and skill, and however much, in a flattering future, that science and skill may augment; yet for ever and for ever, to the crack of doom, the sea will insult and murder him, and pulverize the stateliest, stiffest frigate he can make; nevertheless, by the continual repetition of these very impressions, man has lost that sense of the full awfulnessof the sea which aboriginally belongs to it."

Also from Brit: "For as this appalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half known life."

From The Prairie: "I try all things; I achieve what I can."

From The Honour and Glory of Whaling: "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness is thetrue method."

And, possibly my favorite quote from the whole book.... from The Tail: "Real strength never impairs beauty or harmony, but it often bestows it; and in everything imposingly beautiful, strength has much to do with the magic."

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And there was much rejoicing.

Well, it's finished. Again. Last night, I stayed up past my bedtime and read the last two chapters. They're a doozy.

I've fallen a little behind on my posting things. I've got about 20 different sections dog-eared, places that, when read, caught my eye. What I'd like to do is split it up into about 4 different posts, of five. That way it's not too boring.

From Chapter 54 - The Town-Ho's Story:

"Moby Dick!" cried Don Sebastian; "St. Dominic! Sir sailor, but do whales have christenings? Whom call you Moby Dick?"

"A very white, and famous, and most deadly immortal monster, Don; - but that would be too long a story."

I love this little exchange. It reminds me of someone watching a tv show of someone watching tv. Melville's got Ishmael's telling the Spaniards that the story's too long, and he knows the readers are already right in the thick of it. Clever. It's like finding an easter egg in a software program.

Also, upon re-reading this chapter, I liked it a lot more. The first time I read the book, I couldn't stand it.

From Chapter 59 - Squid:

"What was it, Sir?" said Flask.

"The great live Squid, which they say, few whale-ships ever beheld, and returned to their ports to tell of it."

That'd be a scary encounter. 60-plus feet of flailing tentacles, two monstrous eyes. Yards away from your ship. Added to the fact that you'd never seen anything like it before, and you're hundreds, if not thousands of miles away from the nearest land. Terrifying.

From Chapter 60 - The Line:

"..like the six burghers of Calais before King Edward.."

This is one of the things we learned about in art history. The French town of Calais was besieged by England's King Edward. The people inside were starving. So, the mayor, and five of the other town fathers gave themselves up to save their town. (Something you'd never see today). You can see the expressions on their faces in the Rodin sculpture. Well, Edward was so impressed with their bravery that he spared the town.

"For, when the line is darting out, to be seated then in the boat, is like being seated in the midst of the manifold whizzings of a steam-engine in full play, when every flying beam, and shaft, and wheel, is grazing you. It is worse; for you cannot sit motionless in the heart of these perils, because the boat is rocking like a cradle, and you are pitched one way and the other, without the slightest warning.."

A bit of foreshadowing. Hemp's the only thing that can kill him now.

From Chapter 64 - Stubb's Supper:

"Whale-balls for breakfast - don't forget."

Stubb's conversations with the cook, Fleece, are hilarious to me. Maybe it's the way the cook has of speaking. It could be the way he has to follow Stubb's orders, or even his general attitude, but I can see why Melville could be seen as a humorist after reading this.


Chapter 77 - The Great Heidelburgh Tun:

Quoin. I have no idea what this looks like. Google images tells me it's some sort of architecture term for the corners of masonry buildings, but that can't be what Ishmael's talking about. Can someone draw one for me?


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