After reading the article, “Melville Reborn, Again and Again”, Melville choosing to use whaling and the white whale to demonstrate the themes in Moby-Dick such as obsession, subjectivity, and revenge has fascinated me. He used his knowledge and the popularity (although dwindling) of whaling to write a literary masterpiece. By indulging in the popular topic of the Essex, Melville gave his readers for hundreds of years to come a glimpse into whaling. Without his novel, whaling as we know it might have been lost in history. While it never become popular during his lifetime, it is one of the most well know books in history. For it to relate to topics happening nearly 200 years later, shows the true testimony Melville was striving for.