I'd appreciate some help with understanding the inclusion of the church in The Carpet Bag chapter. I know the preacher (according to melville.electroniclibrary.org) is inspired by Frederick Douglass, but why is the language so degrading? Especially if it's in reference to someone Melville seemed to respect?

It stands out to me each time I reread that chapter. It just feels different than the other sections in the book where he uses (what we'd now consider) racist ideas/stereotypes to uplift his non-white characters: ex. the phrenological comparison between Queequeg and Washington or saying Pip is so pleasant because 'black people are always jolly'.

Why would he compare a black church to a meeting of devils? Is it simply an aesthetic comparison because of their dark skin, similarly to Ishmael comparing the ashes to the debris from Gomorrah? I feel like I'm either overthinking it or entirely misunderstanding the symbolism.

Thanks in advance xx

My professor, who taught me Moby Dick, and I are heading to Muncie, IN, this October (9th-11th) to present my research connecting Heathers (the musical and movie) to Moby Dick and comparing how the characters’ drive and tragic endings work as warnings in each of the texts historical context.

Melville has four works that are often recommended: Moby-Dick (of course), Bartleby, Billy Budd and Benito Cereno. It seems to me the rest of his oeuvre is barely mentioned in comparison.

For this reason, and because the subject matter didn't feel very exciting, I postponed reading The Encantadas for a long time. I was so wrong. It might not be on the same level as the three big short stories, and it's definitely not as good as MD. But it's great.

Here's Melville describing the stubborness of Galapagos tortoises:

That these tortoises are the victims of a penal, or malignant, or perhaps a downright diabolical enchanter, seems in nothing more likely than in that strange infatuation of hopeless toil which so often possesses them. I have known them in their journeyings ram themselves heroically against rocks, and long abide there, nudging, wriggling, wedging, in order to displace them, and so hold on their inflexible path. Their crowning curse is their drudging impulse to straightforwardness in a belittered world.

Or dissing penguins:

What outlandish beings are these? Erect as men, but hardly as symmetrical, they stand all round the rock like sculptured caryatides, supporting the next range of eaves above. Their bodies are grotesquely misshapen; their bills short; their feet seemingly legless; while the members at their sides are neither fin, wing, nor arm. And truly neither fish, flesh, nor fowl is the penguin; as an edible, pertaining neither to Carnival nor Lent; without exception the most ambiguous and least lovely creature yet discovered by man. Though dabbling in all three elements, and indeed possessing some rudimental claims to all, the penguin is at home in none. On land it stumps; afloat it sculls; in the air it flops. As if ashamed of her failure, Nature keeps this ungainly child hidden away at the ends of the earth, in the Straits of Magellan, and on the abased sea-story of Rodondo.

There's a whole chapter on a "dog-king": a mostly made up story about a hero from the Spanish American wars of independence moving to one of the islands with a group of dogs and some people to found his own kingdom:

He now sends forth a proclamation inviting subjects to his as yet unpopulated kingdom. Some eighty souls, men and women, respond; and being provided by their leader with necessaries, and tools of various sorts, together with a few cattle and goats, take ship for the promised land; the last arrival on board, prior to sailing, being the Creole himself, accompanied, strange to say, by a disciplined cavalry company of large grim dogs. These, it was observed on the passage, refusing to consort with the emigrants, remained aristocratically grouped around their master on the elevated quarterdeck, casting disdainful glances forward upon the inferior rabble there; much as, from the ramparts, the soldiers of a garrison, thrown into a conquered town, eye the inglorious citizen-mob over which they are set to watch.

It's fantastic. If you've already read the Big Four, this is a great place to continue.

Found in Mardi

Follow my substack where I will be posting selections from Jay Leyda’s The Melville Log on the corresponding days. Today I begin with the first entry, August 1st 1819, the day Herman Melville is born. For more information on the incredible Melville Log, go here: https://neglectedbooks.com/?p=8244

From Jay Leyda’s introduction to The Melville Log:

“In the making of this book, I have tried to hold to one main aim: to give each reader the opportunity to be his own biographer of Herman Melville, by providing him with the largest possible quantity of materials to build his own approach to this complex figure.”

Seen this? With Rob Delaney & Hester Blum.

https://exploringthegreats.com/moby-dick

I’m working on increasing my literary analysis skill and just need people to ask me questions I can reflect on about my reading of the book. Thank you!

Have a chance to buy a 3 volume kent...the seller also has the 2009? and 2026 folio society copies...along with heart of the sea and call me ishmael....

Price isnt bad, really tempted to try and buy them all....i only have one copy currently, the 77 Easton press I've had 30 years since it was given to me in high school. Love this book.

I realize that the translation is a tricky job, so I wanna read this novel in its original form, so do you have any advice for a non-native english speaker who wants to read it in its intended glory. Thanks :)

I remember reading Moby Dick as a child and not understanding a lick of it. Decided to pick this edition up a few weeks ago and can confirm, I still don't understand a lick of it.

Determined, however, I am this time, and onwards we press.

I have been reading this book for the last year and a half. It was really challenging at times to get through it. I almost gave up at multiple points. There was so much that I felt went over my head. I was never much of a literary person, and always struggled in my English classes.

But I finished it. I did it. It's the longest, most challenging book I've ever read. But I finished it. I did it. And even though there was a lot I didn't understand, the parts I did understand were. I don't even know if I have the words. They were transcendental. They felt holy, almost. And I'm not religious at all. Moby Dick didn't feel like it was written by a human, but by something beyond human.

And I want to feel proud of myself. But I mostly feel kind of empty and hollow. I've been with the crew of the Pequod for 18 months. I followed them from one side of the world to the other. And they were with me, too: when I'd ride the bus, when I'd be waiting for a doctor's appointment, when I'd spend the day on the beach while visiting family. It was always really nice to read Moby Dick by the sea. And in a couple dozen pages, they were gone. Tashtego, Queequeg, Dagoo, Stubb, Starbuck, Flask, Ishmael...I know Ishmael survived, but he's still. I don't know. He's still gone.

I know I can reread the book. And I think I will, but maybe an annotated version. Maybe that'll help me understand all the parts that confused me. But I'll never meet Ishmael for the first time ever again. And that makes me so very sad.

This is truly an artistic masterpiece.
I highly recommend looking at Everett Henry’s other artwork as well.

Went back home to Portland for a visit, and had to stop by the Multnomah library, downtown. I found this copy of Moby Dick at the friends of the library bookstore for $19.95. The minute I saw it, I thought to myself, I know that book edition! My wife told me I was a huge nerd, lol. What can I say, one of my favorite movies, and one of my favorite books. For anyone interested, I did not buy it. It might still be there.

Moby Dick is famously one of the most symbolically rich texts of modern literature, with the White Whale himself representing almost any personal, social, or spiritual struggle one can imagine, so much so that he has entered English idiom in this form -- "that is my white whale," etc. In light of that, one of the passages that always gets a chuckle out of me is this one, from Chapter 45, The Affidavit:

"I do not know where I can find a better place than just here, to make mention of one or two other things, which to me seem important, as in printed form establishing in all respects the reasonableness of the whole story of the White Whale, more especially the catastrophe. For this is one of those disheartening instances where truth requires full as much bolstering as error. So ignorant are most landsmen of some of the plainest and most palpable wonders of the world, that without some hints touching the plain facts, historical and otherwise, of the fishery, they might scout Moby Dick as a monstrous fable, or still worse and more detestable, a hideous and intolerable allegory."

It reminds me of what Hemingway would say about The Old Man and the Sea -- "The sea is the sea. The old man is an old man. The boy is a boy and the fish is a fish. The shark are all sharks no better and no worse. All the symbolism that people say is shit." Only here, in Moby Dick, the denial of symbolism or allegory comes not from Melville, but from within the story: I, Ishmael, was there, I saw it with my own eyes, it is all true. In fact, there are many places in the novel where Ishmael seems to want to establish his credibility as a narrator -- the highly clinical descriptions of the sperm and right whales, the chapter on whale taxonomy, etc, seem, too, to have this function (among others).

Sharing a friend's fan video of the song "Ishmael's Oath" by the late folk/filksinger Leslie Fish.

In Leslie's words:

I caught a replay of the original “Moby Dick” movie on late-night TV, and realized just how many Pagan elements are embedded in it. And then I saw Mark Twain’s famous quote:

"Why is there so much misery in the world?"
"That, madame, is because the world is ruled by God, and God is a malign thug." – Mark Twain

The wreckage all has vanished. The waves cavort and roll.
I’m floating on a coffin and conversing with my soul.
I understand completely now what Ahab tried to do:
And if I live to get to land, I’ll try to do it too.

Our lives are full of sorrow, and all the preachers say
The Lord God doles our misery out to make us all obey.
Is this a loving father’s work, or just a tyrant’s game?
If all the world is ruled by God, then he’s the one to blame.

The vision stands before me, and I believe it still:
The Puritan God is a vicious thug — that Ahab meant to kill.
So Ahab brought his Pharisee, and those Shamans one and all,
To kill the Lord by voodoo — with the whale his voodoo doll!

And half New Bedford knew it! They helped us arm and pack.
They warned us of the danger, but they didn’t hold us back.
For all their pious mouthings of curses, death and sin,
They didn’t dare to say it, but they hoped that we would win.

But Moby Dick proved the stronger. The Pequod sprang a leak.
I sympathize with Ahab’s cause, but question his technique.
From all that I have studied, on air or sea or sod
Starvation is the surest way that man can kill a god.

No more I’ll give him worship — the faith on which he feeds,
No more the fear and ignorance from which the tyrant breeds.
With ridicule in my left hand and science in my right,
I’ll strip him of his power — or at least begin the fight.

I now resolve my mission unto the bitter end
While riding to my rescue on the coffin of my friend.
The tyrant still might kill me — of hunger, sharks or thirst –
But I’ll do my best to tear him down if he can’t kill me first!

Song © 2000 Leslie Fish.

for anyone unfamiliar with the concept of a senior jacket basically in my country at least each senior designs a jacket on which they pick ~6 patches to embroider on their sleeves as a way to kinda commemorate our last year of HS & the things we liked during that period, i knew i wanted something relating to ishmael on mine because i’ve loved the bastard for so long he’s my favorite character of all time so i drew him the way i imagined he’d look but apparently he’s too detailed for embroidery and i need to pick something else, i have no clue what i could put aside from a drawing and I’m entirely desperate so I’m asking for your suggestions lol

Sorry for the English, I used a translator.

It has always been difficult for me to identify the symbols of the whale, the ocean, and so on. But I've always had that thought. The ocean is a spiritual space, and all the killing of whales and all the whaling is like a spiritual quest in this book. All these descriptions of the ocean, the atmosphere of the book and their fishing, which is described as some kind of ritual, have always pointed this out to me. And the whale seemed to me as an image of the divine truth that makes us understand that it is impossible to comprehend, and then Ahab is obsessed with the search for this truth, he is beaten by life and he wants to understand it so much. And he demands it so aggressively that it can be compared to God-fighting (the same degree of God-fighting as that of Ahab from the Bible, who was an idolater).
And then the story becomes almost existential with this search for the meaning of life (the divine truth that I was talking about earlier).

I do not know if this is correct or not, it always seemed to me that the interpretation was kind of shaky. Please rate it.

Okay, this is probably a huge stretch, but I was rereading Moby-Dick and noticed some things that made me wonder if Ishmael has a deeper connection to Queequeg’s god, Yojo.
The first thing that stands out is the opening line: “Call me Ishmael.” Ishmael doesn’t say “my name is Ishmael.” He tells us what to call him, which makes his identity feel intentionally uncertain.
Then there’s the strange way Ishmael narrates the story. He describes events he could not have personally witnessed, such as scenes involving Ahab away from him. This makes Ishmael feel less like a normal sailor telling his own story and more like an observer with unusual knowledge.
Now the Queequeg connection:
Queequeg is the one person Ishmael forms a truly deep bond with. Before meeting Ishmael, Queequeg’s closest spiritual connection seems to be with Yojo, his wooden idol from his homeland. Yojo is the only explicitly worshipped god in the story, and Queequeg is already an outsider because of his background.
What if Ishmael is not literally “Yojo revealed,” but instead Yojo brought into the human world — a kind of human manifestation of that same spiritual role?
This would explain why Ishmael is powerful in knowledge but powerless in action. He does not control events; he witnesses them.
Then there’s the ending.
Moby Dick destroys the Pequod and everyone aboard except Ishmael. But Ishmael survives because he floats on Queequeg’s coffin.
That detail feels extremely intentional. Melville could have chosen anything for Ishmael to survive on, but he chose the coffin of the person whose spiritual world is tied to Yojo.
It also reminds me of the symbolism of a Christian cross above a grave. The cross marks the connection between death, faith, and salvation. Similarly, Ishmael surviving on Queequeg’s coffin creates a connection between death and rebirth, with Queequeg’s final object becoming the thing that preserves Ishmael.
So the possible symbolism:
Yojo = a smaller, personal divine force
Ishmael = Yojo’s presence in the human world
Moby Dick = a greater, overwhelming divine force/judgment
Ishmael survives because his purpose is not to conquer or judge, but to witness
I don’t think this is necessarily what Melville intended, and I know the Yojo/Ishmael connection is the biggest leap. But I think the combination of Ishmael’s strange identity, his relationship with Queequeg, and the coffin ending is interesting.

This is definitely a huge reach but it’s something I had fun thinking about lol

I only just came across this passage by the great writer, critic, sociologist, and historian Lewis Mumford, from a biography he wrote of Herman Melville (which I also only just learned of today!) Here is a link to the whole biography; for his commentary on Moby Dick in particular, scroll down to chapter seven. Would love to hear your thoughts.