It is actually getting a bit fascinating.
Mind you, I never would have gotten this far if it wasn't for strong-willed, pure determination. Melville does not build the climax along like the Harry Potter books. (I have read the first three Harry Potter books and going to read the 4th one soon. All I know is that Rowling really can build a climax that keeps you turning those pages and those chapters. If anything, she is superb at that. Hundreds of pages before the ending of the books, you are dying to know what's going on, like very few authors I have experienced. It's no wonder she was such a hit with these books.)
I just started Chapter 128. My, oh my, are the forces of nature and fate building to the inevitable confrontation in these last few chapter. The weather tries to bar his way. When the ship catches fire on the top of the mast and Melville likens them to candles burning is pretty good. Ahab says, "'Ego non baptizo te in nominee patris, sed in nominee diaboli'" which translates to: I baptize you not in the name of the Father, but in the name of the devil. (Translation from PowerMobyDick.com) That's pretty good, isn't it.
And now they are talking to another ship, the Rachel, who has just seen the white whale yesterday. Ahab is full of joy. I actually might finish this book today.
I might actually finish Moby Dick today. This is a day that has been, what, 24 years in the making? I am going to kill my white whale.
Friday, July 23, 2010
Moby Dick filibuster
Reprinted from http://comics.com/pearls_before_swine/2010-06-13/ by Stephan Pastis. I love how the one character shouts about getting to the whale!
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Moby Dick is prevalent
It absolutely astonishes me how much Moby Dick is in the news and out there in the public.
I kid you not--tonight--
http://www.exploreli.com/events/alec-baldwin-reads-moby-dick-1.2023863#&
Why the heck is Alec Baldwin reading from Moby Dick? I don't have anything against Alec Baldwin. He's fine. The event is fine, a public reading. But why is Alec Baldwin reading from the book? Is there a movie coming out?
Turns out that Baldwin has also been interviewed about it recently. http://www.newsday.com/lifestyle/books/talking-with-alec-baldwin-about-moby-dick-1.2107441
Just on July 15 of this year, 2010, he talks about the book on the Newsday.com site but I can't access the article because I don't subscribe (what a load of malarkey that is--subscribing to a site where I can't read any articles to see if I would like it...)
I found a blog site of a person going to this reading and I have emailed the blogger for more information. Can't wait to find out more.
I kid you not--tonight--
http://www.exploreli.com/events/alec-baldwin-reads-moby-dick-1.2023863#&
Event Date(s)
Thursday, July 22 at 8:00 PM.
Location
BookHampton
41 Main St.
East Hampton, NY 11937
Phone: 631-324-4939
Website: http://bookhampton.com
Email: info@bookhampton.com
Description: Alec Baldwin reads "Moby Dick"
Reading from Herman
Melville's, "Moby Dick," with Alec Baldwin
Why the heck is Alec Baldwin reading from Moby Dick? I don't have anything against Alec Baldwin. He's fine. The event is fine, a public reading. But why is Alec Baldwin reading from the book? Is there a movie coming out?
Turns out that Baldwin has also been interviewed about it recently. http://www.newsday.com/lifestyle/books/talking-with-alec-baldwin-about-moby-dick-1.2107441
Just on July 15 of this year, 2010, he talks about the book on the Newsday.com site but I can't access the article because I don't subscribe (what a load of malarkey that is--subscribing to a site where I can't read any articles to see if I would like it...)
I found a blog site of a person going to this reading and I have emailed the blogger for more information. Can't wait to find out more.
Apocalypse Moby Dick
Since it is summer I have extra time to watch movies. I just watched the REDUX version of Apocalypse Now.
I have tried sitting through it before, but either fallen asleep or somehow changed my mind. I sat through it this time, all at once. 202 minutes. I did have to get up to change the VHS tape (I borrowed it from my dad) but other than that it was pretty much uninterrupted.
And I saw Moby Dick in it.
I know the movie is actually patterned off of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. (Another thing I am going to have to force myself to read in the future.) However, I think there are more parallels to the narrative structure.
It is a very straightforward and simple plot really. Captain Willard has to go upriver to Colonel Kurtz, who has gone insane, and relieve him of his command (read: kill). There are lots of little adventures along the way. The vacuous Playboy bunnies, the bitter French plantation owners, some fighting. Some of the little stories do nothing to the narrative. Sure, they make a statement, telling about Kurtz' insanity and how he got that way because Willard just about joined him. They do make it more human. Although the French plantation owners seemed tedious, it does make a comment on the war and what it did to people.
But that's my point. Apocalypse Now interwove these adventures into the narrative. There were no asides. The things that were talked about were brought up because they were going through those adventures. Imagine: Willard just travelling upriver and just writing these asides on stuff on the war like Ishmael does on whales. No, Willard lived these adventures. There was still a narrative.
So if I were to make a new Moby Dick movie, I think I would do it much like Apocalypse Now. That kind of movie.
Because I think I know more about Kurtz than I know or will learn about Ahab. I'm sorry, I think Ahab is a flat character. However, the Apocalypse Now characters all had life and dreams and personality.
I have tried sitting through it before, but either fallen asleep or somehow changed my mind. I sat through it this time, all at once. 202 minutes. I did have to get up to change the VHS tape (I borrowed it from my dad) but other than that it was pretty much uninterrupted.
And I saw Moby Dick in it.
I know the movie is actually patterned off of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. (Another thing I am going to have to force myself to read in the future.) However, I think there are more parallels to the narrative structure.
It is a very straightforward and simple plot really. Captain Willard has to go upriver to Colonel Kurtz, who has gone insane, and relieve him of his command (read: kill). There are lots of little adventures along the way. The vacuous Playboy bunnies, the bitter French plantation owners, some fighting. Some of the little stories do nothing to the narrative. Sure, they make a statement, telling about Kurtz' insanity and how he got that way because Willard just about joined him. They do make it more human. Although the French plantation owners seemed tedious, it does make a comment on the war and what it did to people.
But that's my point. Apocalypse Now interwove these adventures into the narrative. There were no asides. The things that were talked about were brought up because they were going through those adventures. Imagine: Willard just travelling upriver and just writing these asides on stuff on the war like Ishmael does on whales. No, Willard lived these adventures. There was still a narrative.
So if I were to make a new Moby Dick movie, I think I would do it much like Apocalypse Now. That kind of movie.
Because I think I know more about Kurtz than I know or will learn about Ahab. I'm sorry, I think Ahab is a flat character. However, the Apocalypse Now characters all had life and dreams and personality.
Latest Chapters
I am in the final stretch. I am officially on Chapter 113, even though I can only read 2 maybe 3 chapters a day. Since the storyline is minimal, I believe, it is hard to maintain interest. It is only through the most remarkable self-determination that I am getting through it.
So I still hate it, even though there are shining moments, albeit brief moments.
For instance, Chapter 105 is all about extinct whales and where modern ones came from, are bigger, etc. Yawn.
Chapter 106 on Ahab's leg has a shining moment of interest. He is getting a new leg, one made of sperm whale jawbone, what they call "ivory-bone." It must be very monomanical to get a leg made of the thing that bit it off. If he can't have Moby Dick's jawbone yet for it, this will have to do for now. That is sort of fascinating.
And then bloody Chapter 107 goes off on another tangent again! About carpenters! Again, Melville slips away from the narrative.
Chapter 108 is on the fitting of the new leg (see, three chapters to put on a leg). How embarassing for Ahab. They say a "dismasted man never entirely loses the feeling of his old spar [leg]." What that must be like for the one-track man now.
And then Chapter 109 has a scene much like I am imagining that one scene from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, where Khan's right-hand man is telling him he has a ship to go where he will, that he has already bested Kirk. In this case, Starbuck is arguing like a good first officer about unsound decisions, eventually relenting to Ahab, saying, "'but let Ahab beware of Ahab; beware of thyself, old man.'"
Now comes the good stuff, although there are still asides, however short the chapters are, on extraneous things. Sort of poetic, yes on the Pacific Ocean, but I think it should have been blended into the narrative, have a character speak it or something.
Give me another week or so and I will slay this whale of a book myself.
So I still hate it, even though there are shining moments, albeit brief moments.
For instance, Chapter 105 is all about extinct whales and where modern ones came from, are bigger, etc. Yawn.
Chapter 106 on Ahab's leg has a shining moment of interest. He is getting a new leg, one made of sperm whale jawbone, what they call "ivory-bone." It must be very monomanical to get a leg made of the thing that bit it off. If he can't have Moby Dick's jawbone yet for it, this will have to do for now. That is sort of fascinating.
And then bloody Chapter 107 goes off on another tangent again! About carpenters! Again, Melville slips away from the narrative.
Chapter 108 is on the fitting of the new leg (see, three chapters to put on a leg). How embarassing for Ahab. They say a "dismasted man never entirely loses the feeling of his old spar [leg]." What that must be like for the one-track man now.
And then Chapter 109 has a scene much like I am imagining that one scene from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, where Khan's right-hand man is telling him he has a ship to go where he will, that he has already bested Kirk. In this case, Starbuck is arguing like a good first officer about unsound decisions, eventually relenting to Ahab, saying, "'but let Ahab beware of Ahab; beware of thyself, old man.'"
Now comes the good stuff, although there are still asides, however short the chapters are, on extraneous things. Sort of poetic, yes on the Pacific Ocean, but I think it should have been blended into the narrative, have a character speak it or something.
Give me another week or so and I will slay this whale of a book myself.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Finally a decent chapter
Chapter 100. Finally the tale gets back on track. Finally.
Wait a minute--Chapter 100?? Finally?? Why the heck are we readers putting up with this?? Chapter 100 of a 135 chapter book and now it finally moves somewhere.
But finally we get back to Ahab and his monomaniacal vengeance. They meet an English whaling vessel and find the captain missing an arm--due to Moby Dick!
Why wasn't at least this chapter 30 chapters ago? At least when Melville introduced us to the gams that the whaling vessels had to talk to each other.
Sometimes this book reminds me of Hamlet--scholars know what the heck I am talking about. There are plenty of passages that seem to make the play "grander in scope" than Hamlet merely trying to make up his mind on revenge. Scenes like "What a piece of work is man." Carrying the skull and saying, "Alas, poor Yorick." Heck, even Ophelia's madness scene can be skipped if you're in a rush. I have actually taught Julius Caesar before by not including Acts IV or V, except the very last scene of the play.
However, that is unjust because after all my study, I know why Shakespeare put all these scenes in there as it does increase our understanding of character, at bare minimum. I just cannot make a connection between these extraneous chapters and the plotline or basic narrative of Moby Dick. They simply do not progress the characters. Why should I know that Ishmael finds it somehow fascinating to squeeze whale spermaceti? Maybe if Melville showed how Ahab was doing it (which he wasn't) and just seething with anger. Maybe equating the squeezing with his anger in some way but it is not there.
The little that we get on Ahab is just way too little. I don't know him as a man. Just a thing looking for revenge. Yet, analytically, maybe Melville is making us look at Ahab through only one lens, like Ahab looks at only one thing.
Dammit, I hate it when I come up with a literary reason that actually makes sense to me.
Wait a minute--Chapter 100?? Finally?? Why the heck are we readers putting up with this?? Chapter 100 of a 135 chapter book and now it finally moves somewhere.
But finally we get back to Ahab and his monomaniacal vengeance. They meet an English whaling vessel and find the captain missing an arm--due to Moby Dick!
Why wasn't at least this chapter 30 chapters ago? At least when Melville introduced us to the gams that the whaling vessels had to talk to each other.
Sometimes this book reminds me of Hamlet--scholars know what the heck I am talking about. There are plenty of passages that seem to make the play "grander in scope" than Hamlet merely trying to make up his mind on revenge. Scenes like "What a piece of work is man." Carrying the skull and saying, "Alas, poor Yorick." Heck, even Ophelia's madness scene can be skipped if you're in a rush. I have actually taught Julius Caesar before by not including Acts IV or V, except the very last scene of the play.
However, that is unjust because after all my study, I know why Shakespeare put all these scenes in there as it does increase our understanding of character, at bare minimum. I just cannot make a connection between these extraneous chapters and the plotline or basic narrative of Moby Dick. They simply do not progress the characters. Why should I know that Ishmael finds it somehow fascinating to squeeze whale spermaceti? Maybe if Melville showed how Ahab was doing it (which he wasn't) and just seething with anger. Maybe equating the squeezing with his anger in some way but it is not there.
The little that we get on Ahab is just way too little. I don't know him as a man. Just a thing looking for revenge. Yet, analytically, maybe Melville is making us look at Ahab through only one lens, like Ahab looks at only one thing.
Dammit, I hate it when I come up with a literary reason that actually makes sense to me.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Chapter 94--A Squeeze of the Hand
I just couldn't help but laugh all throughout this chapter. I felt like Beavis & Butthead in the back of the classroom. He said, "sperm." I couldn't help but feel like those South Park kids, laughing at all the little phrases and sentences that just DO NOT mean today what they used to mean.
I just can't help but laugh. I know it is childish of me.
However, this is just an example of what these chapters are about and how they do absolutely nothing to the narrative structure.
Ishmael and everybody squeezes the spermaceti back into a liquid. They also mash it with a kind of spade and he "jokes" about how some men have fewer toes.
What does this do to the structure of the book? Nothing. Delete it.
By the way, don't even get me started on Chapter 95 "The Cassock" wherein Melville tells us all about the whale penis, even how some wear the skin of it to protect themselves.
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...
Would that I could keep squeezing that sperm for ever!
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.
I just can't help but laugh. I know it is childish of me.
However, this is just an example of what these chapters are about and how they do absolutely nothing to the narrative structure.
Ishmael and everybody squeezes the spermaceti back into a liquid. They also mash it with a kind of spade and he "jokes" about how some men have fewer toes.
What does this do to the structure of the book? Nothing. Delete it.
By the way, don't even get me started on Chapter 95 "The Cassock" wherein Melville tells us all about the whale penis, even how some wear the skin of it to protect themselves.
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