Moby-Dick is the greatest American novel

Christopher Buckley on Salon.com says:

"Moby-Dick" not only bests "Huck Finn," it's the novel that best captures our spirit -- and named that coffee chain

http://www.salon.com/2012/06/14/call_me_the_greatest_american_novel/

(Oh, by the way, Buckley is awfully anal retentive on that hyphen of our title, so don't forget it.)

He has a strange list, The Bible, Star Spangled Banner, The Constitution, and the daily New York Times that should be everybody' must-reads, must-memorize. But he also wants to include Moby in there: Which leaves me free to say to my three children — and everyone else’s children, for that matter — that I hope, my darlings, that you will take as much pleasure from the book that has always been to me the great American novel, “Moby-Dick.”

Is he being rhetorically funny when he talks about quoting Abraham Lincoln having read Moby-Dick but not Huck Finn because he died before it was published? I think this may be some sort of humor article, like Dave Barry.

It earned him a total of about $500 in his lifetime. Even multiplying that into 2012 dollars doesn’t quite mitigate the sting. But this aspect of Melville’s failure with the book is perhaps ennobling. If it had been a runaway bestseller, like a much later novel about a Great White Shark, its reputation today might be different. Hard to say. What is beyond dispute is that its author swung for the fence, went for the Big One, risked everything to put his genius and all his art on the altar.


I must admit that one of his main lines of reasoning is the fact that most people come to this book too early to really appreciate that. I can understand that--I hated The Scarlet Letter when being forced to read it at age 17 in English class but then I loved it when I was 30--read again simply because I had to turn it around and try to teach it to 17-year-olds. I tried to make it relevant and interesting, but you just can't make it interesting to a 17-year-old. Moby-Dick was kind of like that--I loved that last hundred pages or so, you know, where they were actually concentrating on the whale.

Call me Ishmael...I mean, Earl...Call me Earl!

Episode 52 or Season 3, episode 5 of the hilarious My Name is Earl TV show:

The episode is called "Creative Writing," one of those with Earl in prison. He elects to take a creative writing course to better himself. He begins to discuss it with his brother, a prison guard:

Randy, the brother, says, "Writing sounds cool. You can make a world where anything could happen. Like a guy all alone in a boat hunting a big white whale."


Earl replies, "Randy, nobody's gonna wanna read that!"

First of all, I can't tell if Randy actually means The Old Man in the Sea or Moby-Dick. I think he has gotten those two books crossed. When he specifies "all alone," this is clearly in contrast to our Melville novel, where people who have read note that Ahab is taking down the whole boat with him. If it were truly a solitary thing, there isn't as much conflict for Ahab. It is the conflict of bringing Starbuck and all the men in on it with him that is the real story. The Old Man in the Sea, while focusing on the futility of the endeavor, also focuses on man's determination--in this respect, the protagonist is a hero and not a looney.

Secondly, of all the fictional references to be made, they choose Moby-Dick. Are they saying how weird the novel and idea are? Why didn't Randy say something like, "...a world where anything could happen. Like a queen of a deck of playing cards threatening to cut your head off while you are chasing a white rabbit," or "...Like a taking a raft trip down the Mississippi to take a stand against slavery." Any other work of fiction could work, but they chose Moby-Dick first.

And these two characters have clearly never read the novel. I doubt they have read any book. I know the actors and writers are intelligent and creative people, but the characters are clearly idiots. Therefore, in this creative TV show, the writers have referenced a story that they think even the idiots know all about.

Facebook is Google's Moby Dick

I just love a good modern allusion to Moby Dick! In an article from Forbes.com in May of 2012, the author, Shel Israel, certainly doesn't hide the references:

It has become increasingly clear since founder Larry Page took back the Google reigns that he regardedhimself as some sort of a modern-day Captain Ahab and Facebook as his company’s Moby Dick.

Page’s harpoon was supposed to be Google+. The social network platform is clearly the best of numerous such offerings offered over the past few years. When he took the tiller, Page immediately redirected his ship so that the harpoon could be sunk into the eye of the Facebook whale.

But of course, the reference being what it is, this is not a good thing--we all see this coming as the text directs itself to the possible implosion that this Larry Page faces. This is the interesting bit in understanding popular references to Moby Dick: we all understand that it goes nowhere!

At first, this looked like the makings of a great turnaround story. The young, determined founder, vowing to do no evil, takes the helm of a great ship floundering in anunprecedented storm. Vowing to avenge cruel and painful losses, he sets a new course.

Someone should have warned Page to be careful what he wished to harpoon. It could turn around and give him a very nasty bite, even a fatal one.

And as Larry Page tried to guide the company:

It was said Page was steering into troubling waters in the same way that Ahab drove his Pequod to where no ship should go. 

Overall, this story focuses on Google+ trying to beat Facebook. Facebook is the white whale that he cannot beat:

It seems to me that Google’s biggest mistake is in treating its very real rivalry with Facebook as a life-or-death struggle.

And, of course, the article in proper bookend format, references the overreaching Moby Dick metaphor again:

Focus is a good thing, but obsession may cause your harpoon to backfire.

Mystery Science Theater 3000 Moby Dick

Through Netflix, I can stream dozens of episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000. I began watching one from 1992, The Rebel Set, when I came across this Moby Dick reference:

Joel Robinson is being "scary" to the robots, trying to tell them a good old scary story, and then humorously, he begins reading from the book Life's Little Instruction Book.

"#198: When facing a difficult task, act as though it's impossible to fail; when going after Moby Dick, take along the tartar sauce."

This reference tantalizes me because it is actually a THEME reference. Over the years, countless critics have tried to decipher the white whale as the ultimate in symbolism. In this reference, it is the difficult task that must be accomplished despite the odds.

Hakugei Volume 6

The last volume of the animated space version of the WHALE saga.

Goes out rather with a whimper, if you ask me.

Dew us the detonation device. Ahab and crew go looking for him.

Ahab: The reason I came to this dying planet was to get back at that bastard. That damn white whale...

The new Federation President is the late Caption Ho's father.

The Federation starts attacking Moad--what do they need Dew and Moby Dick for then??

Ahab: [if Lucky hadn't have shown up] I probably would have forgotten all about Moby Dick.

(Wow--completely destroys any kind of obsession necessary for the plot.)

Moby used to be a physicist named Abel Cain (completely a reference to the biblical sons of Adam and Eve), convicted of treason against the Federation.

He created the planet-destroyer weapon but tried to prevent its use.

Moby Dick's wave uncovers Ahab's ship and they consider it a direct challenge from Moby Dick. Cool.

Ahab has to kill Cain's half/Dew in order to win.

Moby turns and detonates far off into space.

Everybody lives--no final denoument other than the dead android Sarah waking up and just saying the names of all the crew members.

That's the end??

Melville's Bartleby

Just the other morning, an ordinary Friday, I awoke at about 2:45 am. I have no idea why. I wasn't sleepy anymore. I lay there for an hour, restless, and then decided that sleep was not forthcoming. So I decided to pick up a book.

What to read--what would put me to sleep. That's what I was looking for. I had been talking with people at work about the reference to Melville's story "Bartleby the Scrivener" where the character keeps saying, "I prefer not to." We were likening this to some of our high school students. I even gave a copy of the book out and said I would re-read it and discuss, kind of like a little book group. I just knew that I really didn't want to read it at all. I hadn't read it since American Lit in college and hated it then.

So that's what I would pick up to read. That would put me to sleep! Melville!

So I started reading. I got so absorbed that I read the whole thing. I never did go back to sleep.

"Bartleby" is a magnificent little story. Tantalizing with clues as to why Bartleby is like this. The frustration of the narrator coincides with a reader's conscience. This is what we would do.

The other three copiers in the law office are a trinity of man, showing that a young kid, a young man, and an old man all have drive in life--or at least the ability to do what's required of them. That's important, I think, to run the gamut of ages and not letting it be linked to a certain phase. Even the old guy, who had probably been doing this copying since the young kid's age, still does what's required. The young man sees his future as a mirror of the old man's life.

At the end, we discover that Bartleby used to work in the dead letter office. Did these dead letters affect him? Was Bartleby a dead letter himself, with no address or purpose?

Melville can sure construct a sentence. There's some beautiful stuff here. Also, this story PROVES that Melville CAN write a good old narrative structure. It proves that Melville knows what to do. So why didn't Melville use these things when he wrote Moby Dick? Maybe that's a question I need to investigate further. When an author knows the rules and then breaks them on purpose, there has to be a reason. Melville knew the rules.

My wife just says that I stayed up because Melville makes my blood boil and that I get worked up over Melville so that probably is what kept me awake.

Hakugei volume 5

The sci-fi of Hakugei: The Legend of the Moby Dick is actually pretty darn good. It's an intriguing tale altogether, and even if I didn't have this obsession with the classic status of the novel, I would probably still enjoy this while I have been watching lots of anime lately. It's a good show.

Ahab versus the android Robotnik (Jacobs/Murato) and Ahab loses. So Robotnik is a cool bad guy. Mono a roboto Ha!

Ahab: "If I lost to a guy like you then how could I ever face Moby Dick?"

Murato then fights and kills Barba, the Queequeg character. Barba's (Queequeg's) luggage has an inscription that helps to rebirth Barba--is this akin to the coffin in the original novel?

Madam Ohara (Special Assistant) and General Ho are interesting characters. Again, the cool bad guys are actually more interesting than the idea of Moby Dick the whale.

The reborn Murato crushes General Ho.

I wonder where all of this is going. In all respects, Ahab must somehow stop the android Dew from being this detonator of the Moby Dick space bomb in order to save the planet Moad. In other ways, Ahab must defeat the white whale in order to save the planet. The ultimate good guy then?

Or is that what Ahab was doing in the novel? I have read bits on how Moby references the evils of the world. Is that what the novel's Ahab was always chasing, the eradication of the world's evil?

But then that still doesn't help its narrative structure. Nor does it alleviate the torture of sitting through Ishmael's first hundred or so pages. Not to me, anyway.