Some stormy days remind me of the sea--with the sky's angry, dark and spitting rain.
On November 14, 1851, Moby Dick first appeared in the United States, but the novel wasn't recognized as an American classic until many years after the death of the author, Herman Melville. Only 3,000 copies of the novel sold during Melville's lifetime, but the novel has taken on many iterations over the years. It's studied in literature classes in high school and college; and it's considered an important masterwork in American literature for that period.
Melville writes: "There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness. And there is a Catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces. And even if he for ever flies within the gorge, that gorge is in the mountains; so that even in his lowest swoop the mountain eagle is still higher than other birds upon the plain, even though they soar." Read more quotes from the novel. (Or, read the entire novel).
Cover Art © W.W. Norton & Co.
Comments
It is a great book, you need time, patience and a really big open mind when reading it though. Because Melville has a tendency to move past the narrative and search through his thoughts, his interests and his love for whaling. The principle spark that interested me was Ahab and his vengeance for God, and Ishmael’s observations are very thorough and compact. Religion is a major part of the book, which looks at life through many religions, standard and extraordinary. It is a classic with it’s pragmatic and easy going language, but if you can stand a lot of descriptions with a tremendous outlook on what life is, then this book may be for you. But it does take time and patience, I read it for a class and the pressure of trying to finish it by a certain date was hard. But in the end it was worth it, i’m not dead yet.
Never read it. Never will.
Just read this book. Great story but sometimes I had a hard time getting through all the descriptive stuff. It wasn’t till the end of the book that the story line really started to pick up. Saw movie first so I had Patrick Stewart in my head the whole time I was reading it which actually helped propel me through the book.
I’ve read this book in both the original format as well as the abridged version. I never recommend abridged versions of anything…except in this case. Melville is very descriptive and goes on and on about things that people never want to hear about (the detailed process of carving up a whale carcass among other things) and the abridged version eliminates a lot of this but still leaves the meat and potatoes of the story. I really like the story and the characters are a very interesting lot. Over all I would recommend reading this book. It’s almost as fun as much fun as a Nantucket sleigh ride!
I read it more as a self comentary of someone battling depression and trying to come to grips with meaning in life.
This is one of my all-time favorite books. The words just shout at you – it’s an amazing work. I’ve heard it described as “raw power” which I think is apt.
I run kafkacotton.com which designs t-shirts that depict scenes and characters from great books. We just finished up a Moby Dick design that’ll be on sale in two or three weeks (we just launched with “Through the Looking Glass” and “Catch-22″).
I cheered for the whale.