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/lit/ - Literature

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6525233 No.6525233 [Reply] [Original]

Will any book ever be able to rival the raw truth that is Moby Dick?

You have read Moby Dick, right /lit/?

>> No.6525242

>>6525233
>You have read Moby Dick, right /lit/?

I think I read the abridged version in high school. I remember it being far too religious for me.

>> No.6525251

I read it first year of University and was underwhelmed.

I'll give it another go some day.

Could have used less humor.

>> No.6525252
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6525252

>>6525233
>abridged version

>> No.6525258

I liked the first part, but then when it got to the ten page detour on how he will sleep in a bed with another dude but no homo, I lost interest. Skipped to the end. He lived. Eh.

>> No.6525266

>>6525242
oh ok, so you didnt read Moby Dick. you should try it someday.

>> No.6525283

I couldnt relate to the characters and I didnt like the plot. I skipped a lot. 2/10 overall.

>> No.6525284

>>6525258
>queequeg
>detour

How can you possibly consider character development for two of the most important members of the cast a detour? Did you just assume the book doesn't "really start" until they're whaling?

>> No.6525285

>>6525233
I stopped like halfway through because I had to leave on a long term trip. Haven't really had the motivation to go back and finish it because I'm reading so much other shit now and have a huge backlog as it is.

>> No.6525291

>>6525258
How could he have written the story if he died? You could have figured that out from the second sentence

>> No.6525297

>>6525284

No, like I said, I liked the start. I lost interest when shit starting happening.

>> No.6525304

>>6525291

Lots of old novels have that 'I found this fragment in the papers of M. Broham, Esq.' structure. Could have been one of those.

>> No.6525324

moby dick

>> No.6525343

I've read it 3 times and will probably re-read it again this summer.

First read was when I was 14. I remember thinking that only the last two chapters were interesting but I forced myself to read all of it.

>> No.6525350

>>6525233
>read moby dick
>just a bunch of essays about sailing and outdated whale biology
>actual story can be told in two chapters

>> No.6525363

>>6525350

It's not a plot novel, its about inwardness my nigga.

>> No.6525414

How one enjoys this book seems to have a lot to do with one's expectation. I went into the book knowing that most of the time nothing was going to happen, and I loved it. I suggest reading it as if you were slowly sailing through for the most part, enjoying the aesthetic.

Such a beautiful, mighty book if you can get through it.

>> No.6525428

>>6525233
It's a very good book.

My favorite part is where he talks about sailors getting measurements for different types of whales tattooed on their bodies because they couldn't be fucked to write them down and keep track of the papers.

Or any part with based Queequeg.

>> No.6525631

>>6525233
It's majestic. Example:Nor, perhaps, will it fail to be eventually perceived, that behind those forms and usages, as it were, he sometimes masked himself; incidentally making use of them for other and more private ends than they were legitimately intended to subserve. That certain sultanism of his brain, which had otherwise in a good degree remained unmanifested; through those forms that same sultanism became incarnate in an irresistible dictatorship. For be a man’s intellectual superiority what it will, it can never assume the practical, available supremacy over other men, without the aid of some sort of external arts and entrenchments, always, in themselves, more or less paltry and base.

>> No.6525659

>>6525251
Without humor it would have seemed vindictive in parts. Humor was a must.

>>6525284
Ishmael and Queequeg aren't the two most important members of the cast except in the part before the voyage. Ahab and Starbuck are, for certain, but supporting characters like Pip and Stubb are also very important.

Queequeg's relevance is more to the philosophical part of the novel, than to the dramatic plot. He is the pagan outlook that contrasts yet is complimentary to Ishmael's Christianity, and the plot of course is framed in this duality.

>> No.6525669

>>6525283
goodreads/10

>> No.6525672

>>6525350
this would be my only complaint, even though i loved all of it

>> No.6525684

>>6525659
>Queequeg's relevance is more to the philosophical part of the novel, than to the dramatic plot.

The book is literally 95% philosophical 5% plot

if you want plot Moby Dick read the abridged version, it's like 200 pages long

>> No.6525691

>>6525283
>I couldnt relate to the characters
Get a load of this pleb.

>> No.6525692

What did Steelkilt whisper to the captain? Why didn't it stop Radney?

>> No.6525695

>>6525684
more like:
80% biology and the sailing life
10% philosophy
10% plot

>> No.6525705

>>6525684
Yes, but "cast" indicates the dramatis personæ.

>> No.6525720

>>6525695
>4/5 chapters are technical
Imbecile

>> No.6525744 [DELETED] 

>>6525720
>thinking 108 of the chapters are technical
>calling someone else an imbecile

>> No.6525746

>>6525233
raw truth... like the multitude of pages that Melville just literally copy and pasted from textbooks to conflate his novel and make him look smart?

Oh, and by the way, Melville was a pleb; he wrote Moby Dick with the endgame of having it be his Magnum Opus, and selling as many copies of it as he could.

He was Hawthorne's biggest fan. That's about all he was

>> No.6525750

many will say it is his best work, but in truth the confidence man is

>> No.6525755

>>6525720
It was a meme mate calm down

>> No.6525771

>>6525746
So what?
Cervantes straight up tells us his goal is to publish as much pulp as possible so he never has to do real work again.
Why should we hold Melville to a better standard?

>> No.6525781

>>6525746
>he wrote Moby Dick with the endgame of having it be his Magnum Opus, and selling as many copies of it as he could
and now it's widely considered the greatest american novel

>> No.6525810

>>6525692
I DONT KNOW

>> No.6525819

>>6525233
>You have read Moby Dick, right /lit/?
Yes and it was pretty mediocre.

>> No.6525831
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6525831

Even just thinking about Moby Dick puts me in an introspective mood. Sometimes I just think about how the Mobes took Ahab's leg as a funny insult, and how he just can't accept that revenge is unattainable and kills everyone (save Ishmael) through his vindictiveness.

It is so funny and full of human truth. Even the technical chapters are made bearable by Melville's inherent readability (many will disagree, but to me his humor and wit and dank prose is not comparable)

I can't imagine how anyone would prefer DFW or Pynchon or Joyce to Melville, really. (especially not DFW).

>> No.6525848
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6525848

>>6525831
>dank prose
you're my favorite

>> No.6525850

I fucking loved the medical chapters what is with everyone

>> No.6525852

>>6525831
>the mobes

haha. he was a pretty cool dude imo

>> No.6525877

>>6525695
>80% biology and the sailing life
But so much of the cetology chapters and the descriptions of the sailor is important to the way in which you're led to view the books major themes

>> No.6525896

>>6525831
>Sometimes I just think about how the Mobes took Ahab's leg as a funny insult, and how he just can't accept that revenge is unattainable and kills everyone (save Ishmael) through his vindictiveness.

I never really viewed Ahab as particularly vindictive, in reality he is searching for answers to the greater question of life. His madness at having his leg taken wasn't fury directed toward the whale, rather questioning the nature of man's existence and purpose in the face of such creatures as the leviathan. As Baal was to the Ahab of the Bible, he worships Moby Dick. I'd suggest going back and re-reading the Sphynx chapter (you can ctrl-f it here, lol; http://www.clickhole.com/blogpost/time-i-spent-commercial-whaling-ship-totally-chang-768)), and pay close attention to the underlying themes of the questions Ahab asks of the decapitated Whale.

>> No.6525899

>>6525850
How the fuck can you understand Whaling if you don't understand Whales?

>> No.6525946

Guys, try to imagine the anguish you experience when you lose a leg at sea.

>> No.6526054

>>6525233
Does this book glorify killing whales? Im being serious. I have read a lot of classics and I keep bumping into this book but I just cant start it.
The minimal information I have of it makes me suspect that it will tell of people killing whales or it will portray whales as evil or as fair game.

>> No.6526071

>>6525233
I'm about a 150 pages into Moby Dick right now and am loving it. Idk why more people don't read it.

>> No.6526086

I read the book a long time ago, and watched the movie more recently. In the movie, Starbuck is careful and not as vindictive and is kinda wary of Ahab's fervor, but after Ahab falls, he becomes just as crazed, right before his own demise.

Was this in the book as well? I don't remember Starbuck going that vengeful.

>> No.6526095

>>6526054
Of course it does, but that's a stupid reason not to read it. It's a product of a time when people hunted whales with rowing boats and harpoons not high powered Cannons and radar.

>> No.6526112

>>6526095
Well, you are right, it is a silly reason but I nonetheless cant find the motivation to start it.

>> No.6526128

>>6526054
lmao. will it upset your delicate sensibilities you little bitch? and just so you know, moby dick is a tribute to the whale species, among many other things.

>> No.6526171

>>6526128
I knew someone was gonna make this post, feel better about yourself?

>> No.6526177

>>6525831
you just spoiled the book for me im half way through fuck

>> No.6526184

>>6526054
yes it glorifies the killing but melville see's the whale as one of the great mammals, probably second to humans

>> No.6526185

>>6525233

Not only reading but enjoying a book with a gay bottom protagonist tells me a lot about you, OP.

>> No.6526192

>>6526185
I know this is a poop post and bait, but thats such a 21st century perspective.

>two dudes in a bed
>DUDE THEY'RE GAY LMAO

>> No.6526200

>>6526185
>>6526192
>As I sat there at my ease, cross-legged on the deck; after the bitter exertion at the windlass; under a blue tranquil sky; the ship under indolent sail, and gliding so serenely along; as I bathed my hands among those soft, gentle globules of infiltrated tissues, wove almost within the hour; as they richly broke to my fingers, and discharged all their opulence, like fully ripe grapes their wine; as. I snuffed up that uncontaminated aroma,- literally and truly, like the smell of spring violets; I declare to you, that for the time I lived as in a musky meadow; I forgot all about our horrible oath; in that inexpressible sperm, I washed my hands and my heart of it; I almost began to credit the old Paracelsan superstition that sperm is of rare virtue in allaying the heat of anger; while bathing in that bath, I felt divinely free from all ill-will, or petulance, or malice, of any sort whatsoever.
Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers’ hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say,- Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness.
Would that I could keep squeezing that sperm for ever! For now, since by many prolonged, repeated experiences, I have perceived that in all cases man must eventually lower, or at least shift, his conceit of attainable felicity; not placing it anywhere in the intellect or the fancy; but in the wife, the heart, the bed, the table, the saddle, the fire-side; the country; now that I have perceived all this, I am ready to squeeze case eternally. In thoughts of the visions of the night, I saw long rows of angels in paradise, each with his hands in a jar of spermaceti.

>> No.6526218

>>6526200
>DUDE HE SAID SPERM LMAO

>> No.6526343

>>6525233
I read a graphic novel edition of it when I was like 7
gonna read the real thing soon enough though

>> No.6526449

>>6526054
I'll be honest it turned me pro whaling.

>> No.6526595

>>6526200
dank prose

>> No.6526596

>>6526054
Not really. It goes into great detail of the methods, but in the end makes it out to be a gruesome and cannibalistic business. It really neither condemn nor condones it, it simply searches for some truth within it

>> No.6526599

>>6526200
lol was literally just reading this part

>> No.6526768

itt:

plebs don't realise the whale is just a metaphor

>> No.6526777

>>6526768
He's a metaphor, but he's also a whale. Then again, maybe the metaphor was that he was actually just a whale the whole time.

>> No.6526778
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6526778

>>6526768
OH SHIT

it all makes sense now.

>> No.6526782

>>6526112
Just read loomings and you'll get it.

>> No.6526784
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6526784

>>6526768

mfw after I silenced my entire seminar by telling them this

>> No.6526796

>>6525746
Who cares ? Do you only read authors that make a point of not getting publisher ? Must be fun re-reading the Trial three times a week.

I agree that OP's "raw truth" is irritating. It's an overused and generally false stereotypical praise. Melville is deliberately messing with the reader. If you want raw truth kill your own food and eat it raw, bitch.

>> No.6526802

>>6526177
It's a book good enough that you can start it right after having had everything spoiled to you.

>> No.6526851
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6526851

>yfw a 15 year old fedora virgin with zero life experience tells you moby dick is overrated

>> No.6527008

>>6525258
He didn't live.

>> No.6527016

>>6526768
moby dick is a metaphor for the whaling industry