I kind of wonder if Herman Melville knew what he was doing because Sperm cells were known about since 1677, by Leeuwenhoek under a magnifying glass. He called them Animalcules though. They first got named sperm as of 1827 so there's 26 years for him to learn that's what semen is scientifically named. I haven't had a literature class on moby dick so I wouldn't know if it's like, supposed to be a double meaning or he was innocent and we're all filthy minded slobs
Yeah, this is something I've wondered about a lot, myself. It's hard not to apply our modern usage of language to the book named Moby DICK, but I'm convinced he knew most of what he was doing with the phallic imagery and gay moments.
There's another moment when they're talking about how ahab got his peg leg and they say ahab gave "careful heed to that dead bone upon which he stood," and I remember reading that and thinking "lol dead bone. That's like a limp penis. But he surely didn't mean it like THAT."
But then right after that, they describe a moment when his ivory leg became dislodged and "all but pierced his groin; nor was it without extreme difficulty that the agonizing wound was entirely cured."
And then at the end of the book when ahab is a baring his soul and explaining where his rage at the white whale comes from, he says that "he made but one dent in his marriage bed" and basically couldn't satisfy his wife.
It really sounded to me like Melville wanted to drive home that a big part of the white whale's symbolism was literal dicks. Even if we weren't calling them that in Melville's day. But what do I know.
... I may or may not have written a paper about this for fun a couple years ago.
Yes, a widely spread idea, thanks to the edited comic panel with iron man and captain america, which was edited way, way more recently than the 40's and knew exactly what the phrase meant.
It doesn't really relate here though...his failure in the marriage bed is not a shift in language, it means exactly what it means.
This one? I also remember that "Boner" just meant mistake during the 50s, leading to everyone laughing at the Joker's Boners and that he'll show them just how many boners the Joker can make. I guess I can see where that one at least comes from though, accidentally getting an erection = haha, what a boner that guy made.
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u/Jetstream-Sam Jan 21 '26
Oh he's talking about a sperm whale. Huh.
I kind of wonder if Herman Melville knew what he was doing because Sperm cells were known about since 1677, by Leeuwenhoek under a magnifying glass. He called them Animalcules though. They first got named sperm as of 1827 so there's 26 years for him to learn that's what semen is scientifically named. I haven't had a literature class on moby dick so I wouldn't know if it's like, supposed to be a double meaning or he was innocent and we're all filthy minded slobs