1. What should I know about Moby Dick, specifically? A) This is an awesome book B) Melville had actual whaling experience, and his book was a failure at first C) This is a book about TRUTH D) Everything in it has multiple meanings E) It borrows from multiple forms to represent the vastness of knowledge and truth F) It’s also a response to a crisis of faith in the 1850s and a crisis of morality in the form of racism

2. Lesson A: Moby Dick is awesome Moby Dick is one of the two major works of American literature most frequently cited as “The Great American Novel” (The other is Twains’ Huckleberry Finn) As such, it is referenced constantly in popular culture; if you’re looking, you’ll see it everywhere, from The Sopranos, to Mad magazine, to The Onion, to popular cartoons.

3. Masterpiece… Of the novel, Melville wrote “I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb”. – Doesn’t that give you goose bumps? The man can write! He wrote that he felt this was his true masterpiece. – (Readers, however, did not agree, at least not at first. He was mostly unknown until the Melville Revival of the 1920s, and his book had rotten sales)

4. Lesson B: Melville’s life-story matters Melville’s material is the kind of stuff that could only be born of a particular sort of life experience -- an experience that was precipitated by some key events in his life… 1) Melville’s father was unsuccessful in business (importing), and his bankruptcy was too much for him to handle. He fell ill and died when Melville was 12.

5. Melville’s life… 2) As a result of the family’s financial troubles and the death of his father, Melville couldn’t afford to go to college. As it was up to him to support his mother and sisters, he needed a good paying job… 3) He joined a merchant ship in 1837 (whaling was hugely profitable, as whale oil was used for fuel). At sea, his adventures included desertion, captivity, and enlistment in the U.S. Navy

6. Melville’s Life… Ishmael says in Moby Dick, “A whaleship was my Yale College and my Harvard”, and this is certainly true of Melville! Melville took his experiences and wrote two wildly popular travel narratives, Typee and Omoo. These describe his time as a captive among a cannibal tribe in the Marquesas Islands and his experiences an explorer in the Polynesian islands.

7. Melville’s Life… He grew bored of writing popular, but shallow, travel narratives, and began writing deeply philosophical and experimental books full of symbols His book Mardi was such a book, and he considered it “great art”, but the public hated it, and he needed money, so he wrote a few more crazy travel narratives

8. Melville’s Life… When he published Moby Dick in 1851, he knew it was his great masterpiece, but it was a commercial failure, and he was extremely disappointed with this. He became very bitter toward the American reading public. Afterward, his physical and mental health declined sharply due to his struggle with terrible debt, as he tried desperately to support his family (he had four children!), as well as his mother and sisters.

9. Lesson C: Melville as Truth-Seeker Melville called writing “The great Art of Telling the Truth” He believed that he and his good friend Nathaniel Hawthorne needed to “probe the most profound truths, however dark -- truths most people could not bear to see” (Renker n.pag.).

10. Truth-seeking… Thus, we can read Moby Dick as a meditation (an extended and serious study) on truth, or as part of Melville’s great quest for truth. Isn’t that cool? But how does one execute such a reading? What should we be looking for?

11. Questing for Truth Both Ishmael and Ahab (the two key characters) are on a search for truth, and both pursue this truth in the form of the whale We can read the whale as a symbol for truth

12. Ishmael’s Quest Ishmael tries to find truth by trying to understand the whale from every angle possible At first, it seems that he thinks it is possible, if one studies and thinks enough, to find true understanding (yes, of the whale, but we can extend this out to God, man, the universe…)

13. Ishmael’s Quest, Part 2 Ishmael tries to put together a complete classification system for whales, to analyze them from every angle – (This is where some of the boring stuff comes in. But, hey! at least it has meaning behind it!) However, he realizes that this is a never-ending project -- he could study the whale and pursue its meaning FOREVER For him, the whale is full of meaning; he describes the search for knowledge and truth as a branching tree that never ends This does NOT discourage him

14. How does this help me? We can read the chapters on cetology (the study of whales), which are an attempt to dissect the whale and find its ultimate meaning (truly understand it), as an attempt to DISCOVER TRUTH Read the whale as truth (Hopefully, understanding this will help us avoid whining like babies about how boring these chapters are.)

15. What does Ishmael learn? He finds that the whale is such a huge topic that his study can never be complete What he shows us is that the world is so full of meaning that we can’t ever grasp all of it However, we should try! The effort is not futile! In fact, it is awesome and worthy!

16. Ahab’s Quest “Ahab’s quest, by contrast, is not one to classify whales in general, but to avenge himself on one whale in particular. His quest for truth is not generative [it doesn’t create more branches, like Ishmael’s], but destructive. It zeroes in on ONE target” (Renker)

17. Ahab’s Quest… Ahab is ENRAGED by his inability to understand Moby Dick (which he views as the same as understanding the absolute truth of the universe (just as Ishmael did)) He views the whale as a malicious force (thus, for him, the universe is evil)

18. Ahab’s Quest… Ahab calls the white whale “the inscrutable thing” (inscrutable means hard to interpret) He is furious about the limits of understanding we have as humans (he calls this limitation a “wall,” and he wants to break through it) Notice that “wall” and “whale” echo each other (Cool, huh? Yes, it is.)

19. How does this help me? The Cliffs Notes Version: Both men view the whale as holding the ultimate truth Ishmael can live with the understanding that the whale (read: life, the universe, God) is both incredibly meaningful AND ambiguous (can be understood in more than one way; has an unclear meaning) Ahab CAN’T live with that

20. What we learn: Everything has many meanings: truth is ambiguous The universe is so vast as to be incomprehensible to man

21. Lesson D: Multiple Meanings This brings us to the fourth key point… – EVERYTHING CAN BE INTERPRETED IN MANY, MANY, MANY, MANY, MANY WAYS Early on, Ishmael writes about the Sperm Whale’s eyes; it can see two different views at once, unlike man Obviously, this invites us to read the story in multiple ways and see everything in it from multiple angles.

22. Look For: Multiple interpretations of – the painting in the Spouter-Inn – the doubloon – Moby Dick himself – something else? (be cool and find other items with multiple meanings and multiple interpretations)

23. This Lesson Is Long Yes, I know, this lesson is getting hella long. It’s a hella long, hella meaningful book.

24. Lesson E: Form Mashup The novel is like an encyclopedia of forms! You’ll see: dictionary, whaling manual, comedy, tragedy, epic, prophecy, sermon, soliloquy, drama, bawdy humor and tales within tales, as wells as A BILLION allusions from Shakespeare, Milton, the Bible, adventure narratives, and technical books (don’t write all this down, just write that it uses MANY forms (duh))

25. Why so many forms? Melville is trying to look at the whale from EVERY ANGLE POSSIBLE. He’s also trying to look at the novel as a literary form from every angle possible. In this way, Melville pursues that crazy generative (ever- building and growing) tree branch of knowledge that Ishmael talks about He shows that knowledge is vast and can (and should) be pursued among bajillions of different avenues HOW AWESOME IS THAT? So don’t complain about how boring the dictionary-like chapters are.

26. Lesson F: The Novel as a Reaction to the Times Number One: Religion Early theories of evolution, increasing scientific developments, and a new study of the Bible as a product of history rather than divine revelation have created a crisis of faith in the Western world. People are asking: “Is there a God?”

27. Religion… Melville uses Ishmael (an outcast named after the Biblical outcast (Abraham’s son)) as a metaphor for a humanity that has lost its sustaining beliefs and is now in search of new meaning

28. Religion… Moby Dick himself (the whale) is constantly compared to God – In a sermon, “God came upon Jonah in the whale” – The whalemen believe Moby Dick is a supernatural, immortal being – A sailor-prophet says Moby Dick is God reincarnated Thus, we can read the search for Moby Dick as a search for God, or a search to understand God (in addition to reading it as a search for truth)

29. Two: Politics In 1850, the nation was in crisis over slavery, and we were continuing to subjugate and exterminate Native Americans “Both forms of subjugation were underwritten by smug assertions of the ‘civilized’ of their supremacy over ‘savage’ races” (Renker) Melville’s novel explores this issue…

30. Race in the Novel At first, Ishmael accepts American racial hierarchies -- he is repulsed by and afraid of Queequeg, a South-Sea islander, cannibal, and pagan. Soon though, he chooses the kind and heroic Queequeg over a hypocritical Christian civilization: “I’ll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy” Ishmael and Queequeg form a loving friendship.

31. Race, continued Little Pip is subjected to the fearful and violent power of racism… Pip, a small African American cabin boy “trembles in fear before the ‘big white God,’ Moby Dick [and] this passage asks us to see not only a spiritual but also a racial dimension to Moby Dick’s whiteness” (Renker)…

32. So what? We are meant to read Pip against Moby Dick -- Pip represents what it means to be African American in this time (he is small and helpless), and Moby Dick (representing whiteness) is a fearful and omnipotent force Notice: there are MANY ways to interpret Moby Dick (this relates to that point about multiple interpretations)

33. Re-Cap A) This is an awesome book B) Melville had actual whaling experience, and his book was a failure at first C) This is a book about TRUTH D) Everything in it has multiple meanings E) It borrows from multiple forms to represent the vastness of knowledge and truth F) It’s also a response to a crisis of faith in the 1850s and a crisis of morality in the form of racism