Reading Moby-Dick: Part One

My 1986 paperback.

I last read Moby-Dick in 2011. It always amazes me that so much time has gone by between my readings of such masterworks. In this sense time is moving too fast for me (or maybe I'm just reading too slow). I picked up the novel immediately after finishing Blood Meridian and read the first 15 chapters or so on our trip to Destin last October. The story did not connect with me at first. I thought perhaps the novel had lost its magic the way, say, The Magus did. But, that's not what happened.

As I continued reading a question popped into my mind that I had never asked before. Who is Ishmael? Having read the novel three times previously, out of habit I was approaching it as a metaphorical, theological and philosophical tale. Maybe this time I should take a look at the novel afresh, in its mechanics. And the first thing to note about Moby-Dick is that it is all narrated to you as a story by someone that tells us very little about himself. Of course, he is not the focus of the story. He is the teller. Desiring to know more about him caused me to stop and go back.

This time instead of tearing into the 500-plus pages as quickly as I could, trying to maintain momentum through the encyclopedic dissertation on whales and whaling, I paid particular attention to the novel's first few pages in a way I never had previously. So you want us to call you Ishmael? Who are you? It was a question I could not answer. He is the apparently faithful narrator of the tale, but what does Melville reveal to us about Ishmael? Precious little. Ishmael is enigmatic, leaving us to only guess about him, which is why I had never paused to consider him that closely. He is intentionally enigmatic but Melville seems to be telling a bit about him in Chapter One, “Loomings.”

We accept him telling us what to call him without much thought. Importantly, he tells us immediately that the story he is about to relate actually took place years ago “never mind how long precisely.” So our narrator places himself in the future of his tale. He supposedly has some wisdom upon events since he witnessed them first-hand and can peer backward on them through time, with the advantage of hindsight.

Right off he starts talking about the “magical” nature of the sea as a cure for his “November of my soul.” But, more than that, the ocean and inlet waterways attract large crowds from the streets of Manhattan down to the docks and seaside. Yes, Moby-Dick begins in Manhattan. Why is he telling us this? He wants to legitimize his desire for going to sea, of course, but it is more than that. He is telling the reader about himself from his perspective of future wisdom.

He invites the reader into his shoes to “Circumambulate the city of a dreamy Sabbath afternoon.” The crowds flock to the water because “meditation and water are wedded together.” This is the personal experience of the man who wants to be called Ishmael. The text rather subtly enters his sketchy remembrances. Then he wants the reader to consider the vast “Prairies in June” filled with blooming tiger-lilies before obscurely shifting perspectives mentioning “the poor poet of Tennessee” who decided to go on “a pedestrian trip to Rockaway Beach” presumably to be near the sea. Later, he mentions Patagonia in addition to other places, one assumes because he has been there previously, like seeing the American prairies in June.

He randomly speaks of “mystical vibrations” felt on the first trip to sea of a “robust” young man before further explaining that whenever he goes to sea, he does not do so as a paying passenger. Rather, he gets paid for going to sea by becoming “a simple sailor.” He does not seek the specialized responsibilities of sailing or shipping. Throughout all this he reveals a knowledge of Greek and Egyptian history and thought.

Just as randomly he mentions coming from “an old established family of the land.” Could he be the black sheep of some wealthy clan? Even more significantly, “you have been lording it as a country schoolmaster, making the tallest boys stand in awe of you” afterwards indicating the transition “from a schoolmaster to a sailor.” All this before speaking broadly of being employed by others such that “Who aint a slave? Tell me that,” considering the question “either in a physical or a metaphysical point of view.” Ishmael is obviously a well-educated and fundamentally philosophical person.

But he goes to sea for more than just the pay, obviously since there is indeed “magic in it” as he says. He equally goes for the “exercise and pure air” of working on deck in the open ocean. This time, he wanted to go on a whaling voyage, which apparently he has done before along with other unnamed sea adventures. He claims that “the Fates” and “the grand progamme of Providence that was drawn up long ago” made that choice for him.

Why all this rambling if not to offer revelations of character? These are not random poetic comments as I had considered them on previous readings. They tell us much about Ishmael, at least as much as we are going to get. Ishmael is an educated man, living in or traveling through Manhattan for reasons unknown. He was a schoolmaster at one point, his massive intellect impressing his students and perhaps influencing them. He believes in predestination and has traveled far both on land and sea. In short, he is an experienced “robust” man who enjoys escaping the world for what is supposed to be a trip for his own well-being – the cure for his seemingly reoccurring depression. This is Ishmael. And he is mystified at the prospect of “the great Whale itself.”

He decides to go to New Bedford on the coast to catch a ship to Nantucket. But he just misses the only one for a couple of days. So now he has to concern himself with lodgings. Being poor, he chooses the cheapest room he can find and ends up sharing a bed with Queequeg. The Polynesian, in his island tribal mentality, is innocently intimate in the way he sleeps with Ishmael. The black man throws his arm over Ishmael in bed. Later, he “now and then affectionately throwing his brown tattooed legs over mine and then drawing him back.” (Chapter 11)

His friendly interaction with Queequeg, his acceptance Yojo, “his black little god,” and his tolerance for Queequeg's mysterious religious ways prove that Ishmael is a very open-minded man of his pre-Civil War era. He attends a chapel service before finally going to sea (Queequeg is there too). The service takes place in the middle of a fierce winter storm. Ishmael listens to the chaplain tell of Jonah and the Whale and other Christian teachings, indicating that he is Christian and religious to some degree, though his reckless, nomadic ways certainly suggest he doesn't attend to religion regularly.

These small revelations about Ishmael leave plenty of enigma to Melville's hero. As he goes to sea we are told some interesting details about Ishmael later on but there are long stretches of the novel where Ishmael disappears entirely from the often poetic narrative, though he remains ever-present. Much later, in Chapter 102 he reenters the narrative specifically. Melville has the reader (!) call Ishmael “a veritable witness have you hitherto been” but question how he learned all this detail he has espoused narratively about the study and science of whales.

Ishmael tells us that he knows much of the whale from being attached to an Algerian trading ship and becoming the friend of the lord of Tranque in the south Pacific. He became very intimate with the indigenous culture, which was rich in whale symbolism and beliefs. He had a detailed drawing of a Sperm Whale tattooed to his right arm and much of the rest of his body is already tattooed. So now we know why he was so accepting of Queeqeg, whom he considers a “pagan.” He himself was somewhat “pagan” once, living “in my wild wanderings at that period.” Again the broad sketch of Ishmael's open minded sense of adventure is remarkable, even more so because I never really thought of it before. Ishmael vanishes into the vast ocean of the rest of the novel's tale.

It is easy to miss the other things Melville has Ishmael tell about himself. There are snippets scattered throughout the rest of the novel, few and far between and I'm sure I have missed some. He is both “ a good Christian; born and bred in the bosom of the infallible Presbyterian Church” and “a geologist” of sorts. He takes his religious nature seriously but he respects the beliefs of others (at least those of pagans of the south Pacific). Ishmael is broad minded for his time. By geologist, he means he has dug a lot in the dirt. “I have been a stone mason, and also a great digger of ditches, canals and wells, wine-vaults, cellars and cisterns of all sorts.” (Chapter 104) Altogether, this would indicate a man of great physical fitness and strength as well as what we would call today great emotional intelligence.

One of the most obvious personal revelations happens in Chapter 54. A rather bizarre story-within-the-story section of the novel occurs when the Pequod meets the Town-Ho. Melville interjects an in-depth short story here that has to do with the happenings on the Town-Ho before and during a battle with Moby Dick. It is an 18-page tale of how two of the crew almost killed one another and how the Great White Whale devoured one of them before the murder could take place. It is an intense and exciting part of the novel which might seem like too far of a tangent.

And yet Melville tells this story as Ishmael tells the story which occurred two years after the story he is telling the reader in Moby-Dick. We are suddenly projected into another unknown past and we have to remember what Melville told us in the very beginning, to never mind how many years ago all this happened in Ishmael's life.

The most bizarre part of this is that he is telling this chapter (only) as a verbatim interaction between himself and some Spaniards he once hung out with in Lima, Peru. And three of “my Spanish friends” interrupt Ishmael periodically with questions. The chapter begins with the subtitle “(As told at the Golden Inn)” in italics. This is the pub they were hanging around.

At the mention of Moby Dick, an inquiry is shot toward Ishmael by “Don” about this mysterious whale. To which Ishmael replies, quoting himself. “'A very white, and famous, and most deadly immortal monster, Don – but that would take too long a story.'” This occurs roughly 40% of the way into the novel. So it serves to hype the whale again in the overarching narrative.

But here it is humorous. Yes, indeed, we are reading a long, epic story. It is a strange nod by author to his own narrator and what he is telling, "too long a story" for the other, shorter story he intends to tell his Spanish friends. We go back to the story of the Town-Ho and finish it. This is the second ship that the Pequod encounters rounding the Cape of Good Hope. The first, due partly to rough seas, did not succeed in getting close enough to be heard. A “Gam” takes place in meeting the second ship - the meeting and exchange between captains and crew, often involving the boarding the other ship. That is the title of the chapter Melville puts between the first ship and the Town-Ho. As usual, Melville wants to acquaint the reader with proper whaling terms (of that day) as they are introduced into the narrative.

“Gams” take place throughout the novel and are an interesting mechanic Melville employs to further the story. The reader can compare these various meetings of ships to get a grasp of the extent of the voyage and to raise tension near the end regarding the encounter of Ahab with the Whale.

With each ship Captain Ahab requests information about the White Whale. These encounters begin after Melville has told us a great deal about whales and whaling, though there is still much to tell. By now (Chapter 51), the reader is familiar with the routine of the Pequod, making the meeting of another vessel a big event as it would be a real sailor's life. The first ship is the Albatross and the meeting is filled with foreboding. This is the first time Ahab inquires about the White Whale with another captain, our first chance for information on Moby Dick. And yet, it meets with disaster as the captain of the Albatross drops his “trumpet” into the ocean due to the roughness of the sea. The ships disengage with Ahab never hearing a reply and the crew, including Ishmael, considering it a bad omen.

But that is just a tease. Melville has them soon meet the Town-Ho in Chapter 54. This ship is completely Polynesian and offers, as noted above, an interesting side-story of the general dangers of sailing 'round the world, one of the longest chapters in the novel. Chapter 71 brings the story of the Jeroboam, where we meet the crazy Gabriel (reference to the biblical archangel), who warns Ahab against pursuing the White Whale. Ahab curses him and the Pequod ventures on, of course.

Another hundred pages of whaling and whales continues before we meet the next ship. Much like being on a voyage at sea would have been at the time, meeting the Rose-Bud is a surprise. As they approach, however, they see that the ship is dissecting two whales and the familiar smell of that grand dissection engulfs them. No one on that ship has ever even heard of the White Whale. An odd, rather grounding, encounter.

Melville makes up for it quickly. In Chapter 100 the Pequod meets the Samuel Enderby and it is an extraordinary encounter. Ahab goes to the other captain's boat and learns that Moby Dick had taken this man's arm. It is a yin-yang moment with Ahab losing his leg and the other an arm to the same mysterious White Whale. (It is noteworthy that the origin of the expression “it costs an arm and a leg” is unknown. I can't help but wonder if these two captains might have been involved.)

In Chapter 115 we meet the Bachelor. It seems to be a party ship at the time of the meeting. Much joviality is implied. The captain shouts to Ahab to come on over. But the captain has never seen the White Whale, only heard of him. He doesn't believe he exists, he's all a myth. Ahab has no use for their merriment nor their disbelief, his missing leg being of physical proof. It is a rather lively, comic moment in an otherwise heavy tale.

By this time, Melville is building tension in the larger story and the pace of the ship encounters hastens. The Rachel shows up in Chapter 128. That ship’s captain comes to the Pequod on some urgency. Surprisingly, the Rachel did battle with the White Whale only the day before and lost one lowered boat of men to the great beast. One of the missing is the captain's son and he begs Ahab to join in the search for possible survivors. Somewhat predictably, Ahab is far too obsessed with finding the whale than any other possible consideration. He refuses to help the Rachel and sails onward leaving the other ship shrinking out of sight.

We meet the Delight in Chapter 131 as the pace quickens now. The Delight is partially damaged from an encounter with the Whale. With each encounter we are growing ever-nearer to Moby Dick by learning of the great fish's impact on the other ships. This drives Ahab onward in a frenzy. It should be noted that it is Ahab's great fear that someone else will kill the Whale before he does. During the final inquiries, particularly if the ship or crew were harmed, Ahab is immediately filled with anxiety and begs the question “Hast killed him?” Ahab fears nothing more than the Whale being taken by another harpoon.

We finally meet the Whale on page 495 of my 521 page edition (Chapter 133). Though I know the ending of the novel well (it is the most exciting and accessible part of it) I was still surprised by the Whale's uncanny ability to go after Ahab, crashing through a boat to within six inches of his face at one point. A terrifying moment.

Of course, the final meeting with a ship is of Ishmael with the Rachel in the novel's Epilogue. The ship finds him instead of the two boys it lost to the Whale.  It is implied that they are never found. The novel ends with the words “only found another orphan.” The phrasing is curious. Is Ishmael an “orphan” by virtue of being the sole survivor of the Pequod? The use of the word “another” is strange to me. Is he another orphan in the world of orphans? Does it mean finding someone different from who they are searching for? It is a subtly evocative conclusion to the epic novel.

(to be continued)