2B. Moby-Dick (1851), Chapters 1-4

From Moby-Dick (1851) by Herman Melville

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“Call me Ishmael.”

    Question: Why not: “My name is Ishmael," or “I am Ishmael.”

    Consider:  “The name of the first-person narrator implies that he is an outcast from a great family. In the Bible, Ishmael is the oldest son of the patriarch Abraham, by the Egyptian Hagar, servant to Abraham’s then-barren wife, Sarah; Sarah mistreats Hagar, who feels in the desert, where an angel feeds her and reveals that she is pregnant with Ishmael, who will be ‘a wild man,’ whose ‘hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him’ (Genesis 16.12). Years later, after Sarah bears Isaac, she prevails upon Abraham to send Hagar and Ishmael away; in the wilderness, an angel again protects them. Traditionally Ishmael is identified as the ancestor of the Arabs, whereas his younger half-brother Isaac is the ancestor of the Jews” (Melville, 16).

    Source: Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick, Third Norton Critical Edition. Ed. Hershel Parker. W. W. Norton and Company, 2018.

A Mysterious Painting

When Ishmael enters Sprouter’s Inn, he sees a painting portraying a “Cape-Horner in a great hurricane… and an exasperated whale, purposing to spring clean over the craft, is in the enormous act of impaling himself upon the three mast-heads.” . . . The painting depicting a whaling ship being attacked by a whale in the middle of a storm leaves the reader thinking Ishmael’s whaling voyage will end disastrously.

    Consider: On one side hung a very large oil painting so thoroughly besmoked, and every way defaced, that in the unequal crosslights by which you viewed it, it was only by diligent study and a series of systematic visits to it, and careful inquiry of the neighbors, that you could any way arrive at an understanding of its purpose. Such unaccountable masses of shades and shadows, that at first you almost thought some ambitious young artist, in the time of the New England hags, had endeavored to delineate chaos bewitched. But by dint of much and earnest contemplation, and oft repeated ponderings, and especially by throwing open the little window towards the back of the entry, you at last come to the conclusion that such an idea, however wild, might not be altogether unwarranted.

    Question: What purpose is served by introducing the painting this way?

Mocking the Bible?

The biblical references are a little hard to follow sometimes because I cannot tell if Ishmael respects such things or is making fun of them.

    Consider: “The act of paying is perhaps the most uncomfortable infliction that the two orchard thieves entailed upon us.”

    “The Whale (October 1851) omitted this humorous biblical allusion along with dozens of other jocular or otherwise disrespectful sallies throughout the book” (Melville, 19).

    “The pioneer scholar Nathalia Wright counts 250 biblical allusions in Moby-Dick alone” (Delbanco).

    Sources:

    Delbanco, Andrew. Melville: His World and Work. Random House Digital, 2013.

    Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick, Third Norton Critical Edition. Ed. Hershel Parker. W. W. Norton and Company, 2018.

“Retreat from” or “Exploit for” Society?

When caught in the routine of life, a trip to the sea can charge the soul. Money is a consistent topic in the first four chapters, particularly the first two. Ishmael talks about how being a sailor is better than a passenger because sailors are paid, which means that he is partly venturing out to the sea so that he can make money: “I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of paying me for my trouble, whereas they never pay passengers a single penny that I ever heard of.” The juxtaposition between the sea being a retreat from society and the sea being a profitable market for society is something I find noteworthy.

    Question: Is money essentially a source of corruption?  Or is disdain for money a luxury only the rich can afford?

Who are the monsters?

Ishmael [explains] the various weapons constructed by man to kill whales and other humans. He goes on to describe these weapons as 'horrifying' and 'monstrous' (22).

Sleeping with Cannibals, I

S1: I am confused by the description of Queequeg. Was it typical for ethnic people to be described in such language as “savage” and as a “cannibal”? Even the language used to describe Queequeg’s actions have animalistic tones.

S2: What makes Queequeg so interesting is how ominous he is treated within chapter three. The first bit of information we have surrounding him is from Peter Coffin, the landlord, and he says “the harpooner is a dark complexioned chap. He never eats dumplings, he don’t—he eats nothing but steaks, and he likes ’em rare”(Ch.3).

As this chapter progresses, Ishmael … thinks over Queequeg more and more and becomes more unsettled by the idea of him. We see Peter [trickle] more information to Ishmael about Queequeg[,] almost as if he is purposely trying to mess with him. Eventually, Ishmael comes to terms with sharing a bed with this mysterious [harpooner], but it is only after Peter tells him that he is out selling human heads. . . .[eventually, Ishmael] became more accepting of sleeping next to him. (Although, he was still incredibly uneasy.)

S3:  Melville does a good job of building tension for the bedroom scene by having Ishmael ask questions about his mysterious roommate, and then describing each thing the cannibal does once he finally comes home and prepares for bed.

I feel that a reader would find humor in Ishmael waking up in the morning to find Queequeg’s arm wrapped around him. “Upon waking the next morning about daylight, I found Queequeg’s arm thrown over me in the most loving and affectionate manner. You had almost thought I had been his wife” (31).It was funny that Ishmael described it as loving and affectionate, especially because he had been so frightened the night before. I think it is important to consider how Ishmael viewed and spoke of Queequeg, and how that related to the societal views during the time when the book was published. “Thinks I, Queequeg, under the circumstances, this is a very civilized overture; but, the truth is, these savages have an innate sense of delicacy, say what you will; it is marvellous how essentially polite they are” (33).

S4: An interesting [ideological] point is that Ishmael doesn't seem to judge the drunken, rowdy sailors as much as he does his cannibal roommate, and yet Queequeg treats him with respect.

 . . . Ishmael stows away his fears and prejudices after sensing Queequeg’s ‘civil’ nature and allows himself to share beds with the fellow man and woke up to find he was certainly under safer hands than he had previously predicted (61).

S5:  . . . with the introduction of Queequeg, Melville was trying to convey that one should not judge someone else by the way they look. The text reads, “It’s only his outside; a man can be honest in any sort of skin” (Melville 70).

When met face-to-face with the Queequeg, Ishmael is at first shocked to discover his “unruly” acts of bringing a Tomahawk into bed and smoking. Calling on the landlord “landlord! Watch! Coffin! Angels! Save me!” However, upon general introduction by the landlord Ishmael and Queequeg soon fashion the best way to coincide with each other. While this section could have been used by Melville for pure entertainment, I could also see how it could represent the objective of learning to understand and respect the differences of each individual person.

    Several:  “Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.”

    Consider: Cosmopolitanism; America as an ideal