Year of writing:
1851
Reading time:
Description of the work:
The cult novel "Moby Dick, or the White Whale" is main job American writer Herman Melville. The novel is quite voluminous, has many lyrical digressions, and in addition, it is imbued with some biblical images and is distinguished by multi-layered symbolism. Unfortunately, at the time of the novel's release, contemporaries did not appreciate it, and only in the 1920s was Moby Dick rethought and accepted.
"Moby Dick" had a huge impact not only on American but also on world classical literature.
We present to your attention summary novel "Moby Dick, or the White Whale".
A young American with the biblical name Ishmael (in the book of Genesis it is said about Ishmael, the son of Abraham: “He will be among men like a wild ass, his hand against everyone and the hand of everyone against him”), bored with being on land and experiencing difficulties with money, accepts decision to set sail on a whaling ship. In the first half of the 19th century. the oldest American whaling port, Nantucket, is no longer the largest center of this fishery, but Ishmael considers it important for himself to hire a ship in Nantucket. Stopping on the way there in another port city, where it is not unusual to meet on the street a savage who has joined the crew of a whaler who visited there on unknown islands, where you can see a buffet counter made of a huge whale jaw, where even a preacher in a church climbs to the pulpit on a rope ladder - Ishmael listens to a passionate sermon about the prophet Jonah, who was swallowed up by Leviathan, trying to avoid the path assigned to him by God, and meets the native harpooner Queequeg at the inn. They become bosom friends and decide to join the ship together.
In Nantucket, they are hired by the whaler Pequod, which is preparing to set out on a three-year voyage around the world. Here Ishmael learns that Captain Ahab (Ahab in the Bible is the wicked king of Israel who established the cult of Baal and persecuted the prophets), under whose command he will go to sea, on his last voyage, fighting with a whale, lost his leg and has not been out since then out of gloomy melancholy, and on the ship, on the way home, he was even out of his mind for some time. But Ishmael does not yet attach any importance to this news or to other strange events that make one think about some secret connected with the Pequod and its captain. He takes a stranger he meets on the pier, who makes vague but menacing prophecies about the fate of the whaler and everyone enlisted in his crew, for a madman or a swindler-beggar. And the dark human figures, at night, secretly, ascending to the Pequod and then seeming to dissolve on the ship, Ishmael is ready to consider as a figment of his own imagination.
Only a few days after sailing from Nantucket, Captain Ahab leaves his cabin and appears on deck. Ishmael is struck by his gloomy appearance and the inescapable inner pain imprinted on his face. Holes were drilled in the deck boards in advance so that Ahab could, by strengthening a bone leg made from the polished jaw of a sperm whale, maintain balance during the rocking. Observers on the masts were ordered to look especially vigilantly for white whales in the sea. The captain is painfully withdrawn, demands unquestioning and immediate obedience even more harshly than usual, and sharply refuses to explain his own speeches and actions even to his assistants, in whom they often cause bewilderment. “The soul of Ahab,” says Ishmael, “during the harsh blizzard winter of his old age hid in the hollow trunk of his body and there sullenly sucked the paw of darkness.”
Having gone to sea for the first time on a whaler, Ishmael observes the features of a fishing vessel, work and life on it. The short chapters that make up the entire book contain descriptions of tools, techniques and rules for hunting a sperm whale and extracting spermaceti from its head. Other chapters, “whale studies” - from the collection of references to whales that precedes the book to various kinds literature before detailed reviews a whale's tail, a fountain, a skeleton, and finally, whales made of bronze and stone, even whales among the stars - throughout the entire novel they complement the narrative and merge with it, giving events a new, metaphysical dimension.
One day, by order of Ahab, the Pequod crew assembles. A gold Ecuadorian doubloon is nailed to the mast. It is intended for the first person to spot the albino whale, famous among whalers and nicknamed Moby Dick. This sperm whale, terrifying with its size and ferocity, whiteness and unusual cunning, carries in its skin many harpoons that were once aimed at it, but in all fights with humans it remains the winner, and the crushing rebuff that people received from it has taught many to the idea that that hunting him threatens with terrible disasters. It was Moby Dick who deprived Ahab of his legs when the captain, finding himself at the end of the chase among the wreckage of whaleboats broken by a whale, in a fit of blind hatred rushed at him with only a knife in his hand. Now Ahab announces that he intends to pursue this whale across all the seas of both hemispheres until the white carcass sways in the waves and releases its last fountain of black blood. In vain does Starbuck's first mate, a strict Quaker, object to him that taking revenge on a creature devoid of reason, striking only by blind instinct, is madness and blasphemy. In everything, Ahab answers, the unknown features of some rational principle are visible through the meaningless mask; and if you must strike, strike through this mask! A white whale floats obsessively before his eyes as the embodiment of all evil. With delight and rage, deceiving their own fear, the sailors join in his curses on Moby Dick. Three harpooners, having filled the upside-down tips of their harpoons with rum, drink to the death of a white whale. And only the ship's cabin boy, the little black boy Pip, prays to God for salvation from these people.
When the Pequod first encounters sperm whales and the whaleboats are preparing to launch, five dark-faced ghosts suddenly appear among the sailors. This is the crew of Ahab’s own whaleboat, people from some islands in South Asia. Since the owners of the Pequod, believing that a one-legged captain could no longer be of any use during a hunt, did not provide rowers for his own boat, he brought them onto the ship secretly and still hid them in the hold. Their leader is the ominous-looking middle-aged Parsi Fedalla.
Although any delay in searching for Moby Dick is painful for Ahab, he cannot completely give up hunting whales. Rounding the Cape of Good Hope and crossing the Indian Ocean, the Pequod hunts and fills barrels with spermaceti. But the first thing Ahab asks when meeting other ships is whether they have ever seen a white whale. And the answer is often a story about how, thanks to Moby Dick, one of the team died or was mutilated. Even in the middle of the ocean, one cannot do without prophecies: a half-mad sailor-sectarian from a ship struck by an epidemic exhorts one to fear the fate of the sacrileges who dared to fight the incarnation God's Wrath. Finally, the Pequod meets an English whaler, whose captain, having harpooned Moby Dick, received a deep wound and as a result lost an arm. Ahab hurries to get on board and talk to the man whose fate is so similar to his. The Englishman does not even think about taking revenge on the sperm whale, but reports the direction in which the white whale went. Again Starbuck tries to stop his captain - and again in vain. By order of Ahab, the ship's blacksmith forges a harpoon from especially hard steel, for the hardening of which three harpooners donate their blood. The Pequod heads out into the Pacific Ocean.
Ishmael's friend, the harpooner Queequeg, having become seriously ill from working in a damp hold, feels the approach of death and asks the carpenter to make him an unsinkable coffin-shuttle in which he could set off across the waves to the starry archipelagos. And when unexpectedly his condition changes for the better, it is decided to caulk and tar the coffin, which was unnecessary for the time being, in order to turn it into a large float - a rescue buoy. The new buoy, as expected, is suspended from the stern of the Pequod, quite surprising with its characteristic shape of the team of oncoming ships.
At night, in a whaleboat, near the dead whale, Fedalla announces to the captain that on this voyage he is not destined to have either a coffin or a hearse, but Ahab must see two hearses at sea before he dies: one - built by inhuman hands, and the second, made of wood, grown in America; that only hemp could cause Ahab's death, and even in this last hour Fedallah himself would go ahead of him as a pilot. The captain doesn’t believe it: what does hemp and rope have to do with it? He is too old to go to the gallows.
The signs of approaching Moby Dick are becoming more and more clear. In a fierce storm, the fire of St. Elmo flares up on the tip of a harpoon forged for a white whale. That same night, Starbuck, confident that Ahab is leading the ship to inevitable death, stands at the door of the captain's cabin with a musket in his hands and still does not commit murder, preferring to submit to fate. The storm remagnetizes the compasses, now they direct the ship away from these waters, but Ahab, who noticed this in time, makes new arrows from sailing needles. The sailor falls off the mast and disappears into the waves. The Pequod meets the Rachel, who had been pursuing Moby Dick just the day before. The captain of the "Rachel" begs Ahab to join the search for the whaleboat lost during yesterday's hunt, in which his twelve-year-old son was, but receives a sharp refusal. From now on, Ahab climbs the mast himself: he is pulled up in a basket woven from ropes. But as soon as he gets to the top, a sea hawk rips his hat off and carries him out to sea. There is a ship again - and on it, too, the sailors killed by the white whale are buried.
The golden doubloon is faithful to its owner: a white hump appears from the water in front of the captain himself. The chase lasts three days, three times the whaleboats approach the whale. Having bitten Ahab's whaleboat in two, Moby Dick circles around the captain, thrown aside, not allowing other boats to come to his aid until the approaching Pequod pushes the sperm whale away from his victim. As soon as he is in the boat, Ahab again demands his harpoon - the whale, however, is already swimming away, and he has to return to the ship. It gets dark, and the Pequod loses sight of the whale. The whaler follows Moby Dick all night and catches him again at dawn. But, having tangled the lines from the harpoons pierced into it, the whale smashes two whaleboats against each other, and attacks Ahab’s boat, diving and hitting the bottom from under the water. The ship picks up people in distress, and in the confusion it is not immediately noticed that there is no Parsi among them. Remembering his promise, Ahab cannot hide his fear, but continues the pursuit. Everything that happens here is predetermined, he says.
On the third day, the boats, surrounded by a flock of sharks, again rush to the fountain seen on the horizon; a sea hawk again appears above the Pequod - now it carries away the torn ship’s pennant in its claws; a sailor was sent up the mast to replace him. Enraged by the pain that the wounds received the day before cause him, the whale immediately rushes onto the whaleboats, and only the captain’s boat, among whose rowers Ishmael is now, remains afloat. And when the boat turns sideways, the rowers are presented with the torn corpse of Fedalla, fastened to Moby Dick’s back with loops of a tench wrapped around the giant body. This is the first hearse. Moby Dick is not looking for a meeting with Ahab, he is still trying to leave, but the captain’s whaleboat is not far behind. Then, turning around to meet the Pequod, which had already lifted people from the water, and having guessed in it the source of all its persecution, the sperm whale rams the ship. Having received a hole, the Pequod begins to dive, and Ahab, watching from the boat, realizes that in front of him is a second hearse. There is no way to escape. He aims the last harpoon at the whale. The hemp line, whipped up in a loop by the sharp jerk of the stricken whale, wraps itself around Ahab and carries him into the abyss. The whaleboat with all the rowers falls into a huge funnel on the site of an already sunken ship, in which everything that was once the Pequod is hidden to the last chip. But when the waves are already closing over the head of the sailor standing on the mast, his hand rises and nevertheless strengthens the flag. And this is the last thing that is visible above the water.
Having fallen out of the whaleboat and remaining behind the stern, Ishmael is also dragged towards the funnel, but when he reaches it, it has already turned into a smooth foamy pool, from the depths of which a rescue buoy - a coffin - unexpectedly bursts to the surface. On this coffin, untouched by sharks, Ishmael stays for a day on the open sea until an alien ship picks him up: it was the inconsolable "Rachel", which, wandering in search of her missing children, found only one more orphan.
“And I alone was saved, to tell you...”
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, Cervantes, Shakespeare and Goethe. In this article we will talk about seven main interpretations of the multifaceted symbol created by Herman Melville.
World evil, devilish power or evil fate
Whaling, as Americans lived in those days, was not a job for the timid. Sailors who mined expensive ambergris and spermaceti, as well as whale oil, often did not return home. In his youth, Melville worked for a year and a half under a strict captain on the whaling ship Acushet and knew firsthand about the hardships of sea life. In addition, the plot of his novel was based on a real incident that happened in 1820 with the crew of another whaler, the Essex. The ship was sunk after it was rammed head-on by a huge sperm whale. Few managed to escape.
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Captain Ahab from Moby Dick, in pursuit of a whale, apparently lost not only his leg, but also his mind. The hero doesn’t care what the sea giant actually is, he sees it as the source of all troubles and imagines himself as something like a new George, who needs to defeat the dragon in order to save this world from evil.
The unconscious and the internal struggle
Adherents of psychoanalysis seized on the relationship between the tireless Ahab and the “phallic” whale and saw in it an expression of the Oedipus complex. From the Freudian point of view, Ahab, who was left without a leg, simultaneously wants Moby Dick dead and at the same time, paradoxically, cannot imagine life without him. Something similar, according to Freud, happens to a five-year-old boy who unconsciously wants to take his father’s place next to his mother: he experiences ambivalent feelings towards a parent of the same sex. The Jungians saw in the White Whale not a paternal, but a maternal figure, pointing to the similarity of the image with the Sphinx in the original myth and, in their own way, reading the lyrical digressions associated with the female images of the novel.
Material on the topic Opinions 10 quotes from Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The two opposing camps agreed that in Melville's book, Ahab expresses the repressed desires and aspirations of the individual (i.e., corresponds to the structure of “It”). The image of a whale in this case turns out to be another part of the unconscious, responsible for the suppression of destructive desires and aspirations (“Super-I”). Their conflict in suppressing critical consciousness, represented by the figure of Starbeck (“realistic self”), leads the entire personality (or even society as a whole) to disaster. This idea was expressed most clearly by David Herbert Lawrence: in his understanding, the White Whale is “the sacred-sexual consciousness of the white man,” for whom the pursuit of power over the world becomes “a suicidal, manic hunt for oneself.”
Punishing God or the Supreme Law of the Universe
Along with the myth of Oedipus, they found in the novel also retold in new way the myth of Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods. The fat obtained by whalers actually served for illumination, and spermaceti and amber were attributed not only to medicinal, but also magical properties. Attempts at the risk of life to “steal” from a whale what light gives, is reminiscent of the feat of Prometheus, which will certainly end in divine punishment for the Pequod’s crew.
“He whom persistent thoughts turn into Prometheus will forever feed the vulture with pieces of his heart; and his vulture is the creature that he himself gives birth to.”
Nature decided to take revenge on man
In the mid-19th century, when Moby Dick was published, the topic of environmental disasters caused by human activity was raised very rarely. This did not stop Melville scholars of the 20th and 21st centuries from considering the reference to the biblical story of Jonah, who found himself in the belly of the whale “at the command of God,” from two different sides. Many of them not only saw in the “Leviathan” the Old Testament punishing god, but also perceived the conflict between Ahab and the White Whale as a metaphor for the struggle between man and nature.
Rebirth: life and death as one
The sperm whale, “giving up” its fat, bones and healing substances in exchange for the bodies of dead “earners”, becomes at the same time a symbol of life and death, and the myth of human rebirth through the ritual of “sacrifice” is also associated with it. The horrifying cycle of tracking, catching, killing and butchering whales each time ends with the symbolic “cleansing” of the sailors through the kneading of spermaceti.
Material on the topic Informative Classic cinema: Moby Dick by John Huston
After Ahab’s fiery speech on the quarterdeck, the White Whale becomes for the crew that same mythological monster (hydra, dragon, sea serpent), whose death they see as the beginning of a new, better life. But Ahab and the entire crew of the Pequod are not ancient gods. They are just people, which means that by choosing this path of rebirth, they themselves turn into victims. Only one of them will be saved: the one who is able not to fight “chaos” and “darkness”, not to ignore them, but to take the position of an observer, a person who knows.
The truth that Ishmael seeks to know
From the very first pages of the novel, the young sailor shows an increased interest in everything related to whales. He admits that sea life can distract him from the depressed state from which he cannot escape on land. Ishmael treats sperm whales not only as a source of wealth or fame for a sailor, he strives to learn new things without breaking boundaries, and notices every detail, collecting bits and pieces of information about the White Whale. The young man, unlike the indifferent Stubb and Ahab, who projects his thoughts and feelings outward, is capable of intuitive knowledge of the truth.
“Everyone has doubts, many know how to deny, but few people, doubting and denying, also know influx. Doubt in all earthly truths and knowledge by inspiration of some heavenly truths - such a combination does not lead to either faith or unbelief, but teaches a person to equally respect both.”
Mystery as an unsolved symbol
Literary scholars often focus on the fact that Melville makes the image of the White Whale ambiguous only for the reader. Each of the characters sees the “leviathan” in their own way and is limited by this point of view. The number of interpretations of the symbol, or more precisely the mythologeme of “Moby Dick,” continues to grow even now: each researcher finds in the novel new meanings that are in tune with his worldview and the challenges of the era. The whale painted by Herman Melville means too many things to remain specific. Therefore, for a thoughtful reader and a stubborn researcher, he gradually becomes what frightened the hero-narrator so much: “the visible absence of any color,” emptiness or a mystery that cannot be solved.
Today we will look at the most famous arbitrariness of the American writer Herman Melville, or rather its brief content. "Moby Dick, or the White Whale" is a novel based on real events. It was written in 19651.
About the book
“Moby Dick, or the White Whale” (a brief summary is presented below) became the main work of G. Melville, a representative of American romanticism. This novel is replete with numerous lyrical discussions, has references to biblical stories, and is replete with symbols. Perhaps this is why it was not accepted by his contemporaries. Neither critics nor readers understood the full depth of the work. It was only in the 20s of the 20th century that the novel seemed to be rediscovered, paying tribute to the author’s talent.
History of creation
The plot of the novel was based on real events, which can be confirmed by a brief retelling. Herman Melville (“Moby Dick” became the pinnacle of his work) took as the basis for his work an incident that happened on the ship “Essex”. This ship went fishing in 1819 in Massachusetts. For a whole year and a half, the crew hunted whales, until one day a huge sperm whale put an end to it. On November 20, 1820, the ship was rammed several times by a whale.
After the shipwreck, 20 sailors survived and managed to get on boats to Henderson Island, which was uninhabited in those years. After some time, some of the survivors went to look for the mainland, the rest remained on the island. The travelers wandered at sea for 95 days. Only two survived - the captain and another sailor. They were picked up by a whaling ship. They were the ones who spoke about what happened to them.
In addition, the pages of the novel also included personal experience Melville, who sailed on a whaling ship for a year and a half. Many of his then acquaintances turned out to be heroes of the novel. Thus, one of the co-owners of the ship appears in the work under the name Bildad.
Summary: “Moby Dick, or the White Whale” (Melville)
The main character is a young man Ishmael. He is experiencing severe financial problems, and life on land is gradually starting to bore him. Therefore, he decides to go on a whaling ship, where he can make good money, and it is generally impossible to get bored at sea.
Nantucket is the oldest American port city. However, by the beginning of the 19th century, it ceased to be the largest fishing center; it was replaced by younger ones. However, it is important for Ishmael to hire a ship here.
On the way to Nantucket, Ishmael stops in another port town. Here you can meet savages on the streets who have moored ships on some unknown island. The buffet counters are made from huge whale jaws. And preachers in churches climb up to the pulpit.
At the inn, the young man meets Queequeg, a native harpooner. Very quickly they become good friends, so they decide to board the ship together.
"Pequod"
This is just the beginning of our summary. “Moby Dick, or the White Whale” is a novel that begins in the port city of Nantucket, where Ishmael and his new friend are hired on the Pequod ship. The whaler is preparing for a circumnavigation of the world, which will last 3 years.
Ishmael learns the story of the ship's captain. On the last voyage, Ahab, having fought with a whale, lost his leg. After this event he became melancholic and gloomy and most spends time in his cabin. And on the way back from the voyage, as the sailors say, he was even out of his mind for some time.
However, Ishmael did not attach much importance to this and some other strange events associated with the ship. Having met a suspicious stranger on the pier who began to predict the death of the Pequod and its entire crew, the young man decided that he was just a beggar and a swindler. And he considered the vague dark figures that boarded the ship at night and then seemed to dissolve on it to be simply the fruit of his fantasies.
Captain
The oddities associated with the captain and his ship are confirmed by the summary. Moby Dick continues with Ahab leaving his cabin only a few days after the voyage began. Ishmael saw him and was struck by the captain’s gloom and the imprint of incredible inner pain on his face.
Especially so that the one-legged captain could maintain balance during strong rolling, in deck boards small holes were cut into which he placed his artificial leg, made from the jaw of a sperm whale.
The captain gives the order to the sailors to look out for the white whale. Ahab does not communicate with anyone, he is closed and demands from the team only unquestioning obedience and instant execution of his orders. Many of these commands cause confusion among subordinates, but the captain refuses to explain anything. Ishmael understands that some dark secret lurks in the captain’s gloomy reverie.
First time at sea
“Moby Dick” is a book whose summary tells about the feelings experienced by a person who goes to sea for the first time. Ishmael carefully observes life on a whaling ship. Melville devotes a lot of space to these descriptions on the pages of his freedom. Here you can find descriptions of all kinds of auxiliary tools, and rules, and basic techniques for hunting whales, and the methods by which spermaceti, a substance consisting of animal fat, is extracted from fish.
There are chapters in the novel that are devoted to various books about whales, reviews of the structures of whale tails, fountains, and skeletons. There are even references to sperm whale figurines made from stone, bronze and other materials. Throughout the novel, the author inserts various information about these extraordinary mammals.
Golden doubloon
Our summary continues. "Moby Dick" is a novel interesting not only for its reference materials and information about whales, but also a fascinating story. So, one day Ahab gathers the entire crew of the Pequod, who sees a golden doubloon nailed to the mast. The captain says that the coin will go to the one who first notices the approach of the white whale. This albino sperm whale is known among whalers as Moby Dick. It terrifies sailors with its ferocity, enormous size and unprecedented cunning. His skin is covered with scars from harpoons, as he often fought with people, but invariably emerged victorious. This incredible resistance, which usually ended in the death of the ship and crew, taught the whalers not to make any attempt to catch him.
A chapter-by-chapter summary tells about the terrible meeting between Ahab and Moby Dick. G. Melville describes how the captain lost his leg when, finding himself among the wreckage of the ship, he rushed in a rage at the sperm whale with one knife in his hand. After this story, the captain announces that he is going to chase the white whale until its carcass is on the ship.
Hearing this, Starbeck, the first mate, objects to the captain. He says that it is unreasonable to take revenge on a creature devoid of reason for the actions that it committed in obedience to blind instinct. Moreover, there is blasphemy in this. But the captain, and then the whole crew, begin to see the image of a white whale as the embodiment of universal evil. They curse the sperm whale and drink to its death. Only one cabin boy, the black boy Pip, offers a prayer to God, asking for protection from these people.
The pursuit
A summary of the work “Moby Dick, or the White Whale” tells how the Pequod first met sperm whales. Boats begin to be lowered into the water, and at that moment those same mysterious dark ghosts appear - Ahab's personal crew, recruited from people from South Asia. Until this moment, Ahab hid them from everyone, keeping them in the hold. The unusual sailors are led by a middle-aged, sinister-looking man named Fedalla.
Even though the captain is only pursuing Moby Dick, he cannot completely give up hunting other whales. Therefore, the ship tirelessly hunts, and the barrels with spermaceti are filled. When the Pequod meets other ships, the captain first asks if the sailors have seen a white whale. Most often, the answer is a story about how Moby Dick killed or maimed someone from the team.
New ominous prophecies are also heard: a distraught sailor from a ship infected with an epidemic warns the crew about the fate of the sacrileges who risked entering into battle with the embodiment of God's wrath.
One day, fate brings the Pequod together with another ship, whose captain harpooned Moby Dick, but as a result was seriously wounded and lost his arm. Ahab speaks to this man. It turns out that he does not even think of taking revenge on the whale. However, he reports the coordinates where the ship collided with the sperm whale.
Starbeck again tries to warn the captain, but all in vain. Ahab orders a harpoon to be forged from the hardest steel on the ship. And to harden a formidable weapon there's blood coming out three harpooners.
Prophecy
More and more, Moby Dick becomes a symbol of evil for the captain and his crew. Short description focuses on the events that happen to Queequeg, Ishmael's friend. The harpooner falls ill from hard work in the damp and feels his imminent death. He asks Ishmael to make a funeral boat for him, on which his body would glide on the waves. When Queequeg recovers, they decide to convert the canoe into a rescue buoy.
At night, Fedallah tells the captain a terrible prophecy. Before he dies, Ahab will see two hearses: one made by an inhuman hand, the second from American wood. And only hemp can cause death to the captain. But before that, Fedalla himself will have to die. Ahab does not believe - he is too old to end up on the gallows.
Approximation
There are more and more signs that the ship is approaching the place where Moby Dick lives. The chapter summary describes a ferocious storm. Starbeck is convinced that the captain will lead the ship to destruction, but does not dare to kill Ahab, trusting fate.
During a storm, the ship meets another ship - the Rachel. His captain reports that he was chasing Moby Dick the day before, and asks Ahab to help him find his 12-year-old son, who was carried away along with the whaleboat. However, the captain of the Pequod refuses.
Finally, a white hump is seen in the distance. The whale's ship chases it for three days. And then the Pequod catches up with him. However, Moby Dick immediately attacks and bites the captain's whaleboat in two. With great difficulty he manages to save him. The captain is ready to continue the hunt, but the whale is already swimming away from them.
By morning the sperm whale is overtaken again. Moby Dick smashes two more whaleboats. The drowning sailors are lifted aboard, and it turns out that Fedalla has disappeared. Ahab begins to be afraid, he remembers the prophecy, but he can no longer give up the pursuit.
The third day
Captain Moby Dick beckons. The summary of all the chapters paints a picture of dark omens, but Ahab is obsessed with his desire. The whale again destroys several whaleboats and tries to leave, but Ahab continues to pursue him in the only boat. Then the sperm whale turns and rams the Pequod. The ship begins to sink. Ahab throws the last harpoon, the wounded whale suddenly plunges into the depths and carries away the entangled one. hemp rope captain. The ship is pulled into the funnel, and the last whaleboat, where Ishmael is located, is also pulled into it.
Denouement
Only Ishmael is left alive from the entire crew of the ship by Melville. Moby Dick (the summary confirms this), wounded but alive, goes into the depths of the ocean.
The main character miraculously manages to survive. The only thing that survived from the ship was the failed and tarred coffin of his friend. It is on this structure that the hero spends a day on the open sea until the sailors from the ship “Rachel” find him. The captain of this ship still hoped to find his lost child.
"Moby Dick" is one of the most famous works of American literature. Contemporaries did not appreciate Herman Melville's novel, but, years later, critics returned the multi-page work from oblivion. The story of the battle of sailors with a giant white whale was repeatedly filmed. Interestingly, the plot was based on a real incident, and the trials that the whalers had to endure in life were much more terrible than those described in the novel...
According to Hermine Melville, the novel "Moby Dick" was about a whaling ship that went fishing. His captain, Ahava, lost his leg while hunting a giant white whale and was obsessed with taking revenge on the whale at all costs. At the same time, the albino whale struck fear into all whalers: due to its impressive size, no one could defeat the oceanic giant.
The fateful meeting of the Pequod and Moby Dick takes place. In an unequal battle, the entire crew dies, leaving only the sailor Ishmael alive, for whom this trip was the first experience of participation in whaling.
The real story of the Essex crew turned out to be much more tragic. Failures followed the ship from the very departure: first, the ship got into heavy storm, then was forced to drift in a distant port, waiting out bad weather. The captain made the decision to go to the “Sea Land”, a special area in the South Pacific Ocean where there were many whales, with caution: the journey was too long.
As it turned out, the fears were not in vain. Having reached the right place and going out hunting, the crew saw that same Moby Dick. The whale rammed the ship several times until it sank like a piece of wood. The sailors were forced to urgently transfer to whaleboats (special lifeboats). In total, 20 sailors were saved; they managed to take with them almost 300 kg of biscuits, several turtles and 750 liters of water.
Path to the nearest one desert island took the sailors a month. During this time they became hungry and thirsty. Having sailed to the wreck, we were happy to find fresh water, birds and crabs. The temporary shelter supplied them with food for a week, but after the supplies were depleted, 17 people decided to sail on. Three remained on the island.
What happened next defies morality and the laws of common sense. During the next storm, the boats lost each other, but over time, the same thing began to happen on each of them. People began to die of hunger, the first two were buried by the sea, and the rest... it was decided to eat. This was the only way to prolong the lives of those who were still holding out. One of the sailors was killed and eaten by lot, since it was unbearable to wait for natural death.
Nothing is known about the fate of one of the boats (it is generally accepted that everyone on it died), the other two were in different time spotted by passing ships. The surviving sailors were rescued, and they spoke about their comrades who remained on the island. The islanders were rescued on April 5 (the fateful meeting with the whale took place on November 20), they were all able to survive on the island. In total, 8 people from the entire crew survived. Amazingly, the surviving captain of the ship did not end his naval career. He went to sea several more times, but each time his ships were wrecked. After a while, the ship owners refused to cooperate with him, and he ended his life working as a night watchman.
To understand how big the monster was that the brave sailors encountered, just look at!
Nathaniel Hawthorne
as a sign of respect
before his genius
this book is dedicated to
Herman Melville
Etymology
(Information collected by the Assistant Teacher of the Classical Gymnasium, who subsequently died of consumption)
I see him as he is now - so pale, in a shabby frock coat and with the same shabby brains, soul and body. He spent his days dusting off old dictionaries and grammars with his extraordinary handkerchief, decorated, as if in mockery, with the colorful flags of all the nations of the world. He liked to dust off old grammars; this peaceful activity made him think about death.
Etymology
......“If you undertake to instruct others and teach them that in our language the fish-whale is called the word whale, while omitting, due to your own lack of education, the letter h, which alone expresses almost the entire meaning of this word, you are spreading not knowledge, but misconceptions.” .
...“Whale*** Swedish. and Danish hval. The name of this animal is associated with the concept of roundness, since in Danish hvalt means “curved, vaulted.”
“Whale*** comes directly from Dutch and German wallen, Anglo-Saxon. walw-ian – “to ride, flounder.”
Hebrew –
Greek – ?????
Latin – cetus
Anglo-Saxon – wh?l
Danish – hvalt
Dutch – wal
Swedish – hwal
Icelandic – whale
English – whale
French – baleine
Spanish – ballena
Fiji - Peki Nui Nui
Erromango - pehi-nui-nui
Extracts
(Collected by the Junior Assistant Librarian)
The reader will be able to make sure that this poor Junior Assistant, a simple-minded reader and bookworm, rummaged through entire Vatican libraries and all second-hand bookstores in the world in search of any - even random - references to whales that he could only encounter in any books. , from sacred to blasphemous. And therefore, these random whale quotations, although undoubtedly genuine, should not in all cases be understood as the holy and indisputable gospel of cetology. This is not true at all. Excerpts from the works of all these ancient authors and poets mentioned here are of interest and value to us only insofar as they give us a general bird's eye view of everything that has ever happened, in any connection and on any occasion, it is said , invented, mentioned and sung about Leviathan by all nations and generations, including the present.
So, farewell, poor Junior Assistant, whose commentator I am. You belong to that joyless tribe that no wine in this world can warm you up and for whom even white sherry would be too pink and strong; but with people like you, it’s sometimes nice to sit alone, feeling also unhappy and lonely, and, reveling in the tears shed, imbued with friendliness towards your interlocutor; and I want to tell you directly, without mincing words, while our eyes are wet and our glasses are dry and there is sweet sadness in our hearts: “Give up this business, Junior Assistants! After all, the more effort you make to please the world, the less gratitude you will receive! Oh, if I could clear Hampton Court or the Tuileries Palace for you! But quickly swallow your tears and raise your head, soar in spirit! higher, higher, to the very top of the mainmast! for your comrades, who have preceded you, are clearing the seven-story heavens for you, driving away the true minions - Gabriel, Michael and Raphael - before your arrival. Here we only clink our broken hearts – there you can move your unbreakable cups together!”
Extracts
......“And God created great whales.”
...“Beyond Leviathan the path shines,
The abyss seems gray."
...“And the Lord prepared big fish to consume Jonah."
...“There are ships sailing there; Leviathan is there, whom You created to play in it.”
...“On that day the Lord will smite with His heavy and great and strong sword Leviathan the upright running serpent, and Leviathan the crooked serpent, and He will kill the sea serpent.”
...“And whatever other object finds itself in the chaos of the mouth of this monster, be it an animal, a ship or a stone, it instantly disappears in its huge fetid throat and perishes in the black abyss of its belly.”
...“In the Indian Sea are found the greatest and most enormous fish that exist in the world; among them the Whales, or Water-Spinners, called Balaene, which are as long as four acres, or arpans, of land.”
...“And we had not spent two days sailing, when suddenly one day at dawn we saw a great many whales and other sea monsters. Of these, one was truly gigantic in size. He approached us, keeping his mouth open, raising waves on his sides and foaming the sea in front of him.”
...“He also came to our country in order to catch whales here, for the tusks of these animals provide very valuable bone, samples of which he brought as a gift to the king***. The largest whales, however, are caught off the coast of his homeland, some of them forty-eight, others fifty yards in length. He says that he and five others killed sixty whales in two days.”
“And while everything in the world, be it a living creature or a ship, indifferently, falling into the terrible abyss that is the throat of this monster (whale), immediately dies, swallowed up forever, the sea gudgeon itself retires there and sleeps there in complete security."
