/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.20227211]

Herman Melville having a sense of humor? Or did people really do this back in the day?

[Anonymous No.20227218]

>>20227211
Can you imagine the stench?

[Anonymous No.20227237]

>>20227211
Do what?

[Anonymous No.20227245]

>>20227211
Eww that's gross

[Anonymous No.20227250]

>>20227237
Stack things on poop. Like actual poop.

[Anonymous No.20227259]

poop?

[Anonymous No.20227299]

Absolute state of lit

[Anonymous No.20227350]

>>20227211
>poop
It caught me by surprise when I first stumbled upon the word in another story, and after some really weird imagery I looked it up and it's just a structure at the stern of the vessel. Still a bit funny.
Wonder how it got the... other meaning?

[Anonymous No.20227356]

>/lit/ doesn't know what a poop deck is
Like, it never occurred to me that there was anything funny reading the paragraph. Reading Treasure Island when I was 8 was far harder going than this.

[Anonymous No.20227359]

Dropped it because of this. Le poopoo jokes xD.

[Anonymous No.20227393]

>>20227356
I'm an esl, I can honestly say the word never came up in context of ship parts, cause most people wouldn't really be in position that they have to know it anyway. That's just one of those you have to be surprised by first.

[Anonymous No.20227455]

I thought poop deck is where sailors shat overboard.
Alright how did defecation work on boats?

[Anonymous No.20227457]

>>20227455
Poop in bucket then throw it overboard.

[Anonymous No.20227459]

>>20227457
Doesn't the bucket smell?

[Anonymous No.20227464]

>>20227459
Those niggers hadn't taken a bath in months. A stinky bucket was the least of their problems.

[Anonymous No.20227504]

>>20227464
Why not? Certainly there was no shortage of water.
Though I don't want to shit up the thread with OT if you have a detailed account of mundabe life at sea I would greatly appreciate that.

[Anonymous No.20227738]

>>20227393
all americans know about poop decks because of the children's cartoon "spongebob squarepants" which referenced ship parts including poop decks quite often

[Anonymous No.20227832]

>>20227237
>stacked his muskets on the poop

[Anonymous No.20227834]

>>20227459
yes. they also had to share a sponge to wash their asses with

[Anonymous No.20228516]

real latin learners will know this by the phrase "Aneas in pupi stat"

[Anonymous No.20228525]

>poop

[Anonymous No.20228768]

>>20227211
bruh...

[Anonymous No.20228781]

>>20227464
>>20227504
They would've washed as best they could. Cleanliness was important in general, as it always was, but on a tightly packed ship it becomes vital.

[Anonymous No.20228934]

>>20227459
Cedar was the traditional wood choice and the cedar throne will smell of cedar if cared for. You would not actually just dump it, you lower it into the water so it gets a salt water rinse as well and the salt helps to keep foul smells from developing.
>>20227464
Every storm results in a bath and you regularly would wash the salt from your body and clothes since clothes stiff with salt abrades the skin and salt water left to dry on the skin causes salt water boils to form, both of these result in wounds which can easily become infected. Sailors tended to be cleaner than the average person since the alternative was not pleasant. This is why we have phrases like "ship shape" and "bristol fashion" to refer to things which are clean and orderly, it was how things were kept on boats because the lives of the crew depended on it. When away from land and in fair weather most of the crews duty was just keeping everything ship shape since most of the time they only needed a few people to actually sail the ship, but they need a good number more when the weather changed, sailing through shallow waters, getting into port, etc.

The myth of sailors being filthy is likely from their tendency to be drunks when in port and freed from the strict order of life on a ship.