Author Archives: Adria Lopez

Sweet suffocation

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In chapter 78, Tashtego suffers an accident while harvesting from the whale’s head. He falls inside it and almost drowns as the head drops into the sea. Our (or should I say Ishmael’s, for he has claimed him as his own) Queequeg bravely jumps in the water and “delivers” Tashtego, both like in birth and from death. At the end of the chapter, Melville explains what would have happened were it not for these heroics. He says, “Had Tashtego perished in that head, it had been a very precious perishing; smothered in the very whitest and daintiest of fragrant spermaceti; coffined, hearsed, and tombed in the secret inner chamber and sanctum sanctorum of the whale” (377). In this passage, Melville is offering a critique of the American view that, sometimes, death and suffering can be seen as necessary and even sacred, mostly when it involves minorities. Death is the end all be all of human existence, the destiny we will all reach. But Melville uses language like “precious” and “sanctum sanctorum” which glorifies this specific type of death. It is also not coincidental that Tashtego, the only Native American out of the harpooneers, was the one who almost died “smothered in the very whitest and daintiest of fragrant spermaceti.” These details are meant to represent Native American suffering at the hands of imperialist white Americans and how this imperialism that leads to death is represented as sweet and even holy. Expansionism and Manifest Destiny where prominent at the time and anything horrific committed in the name of these beliefs was thought to be good and even guided by God. People who suffered from it should have considered themselves lucky to play a part in this great fulfillment of God’s will, even if their part only consisted of pain and death. The reality was that Native Americans, like many minorities, were considered to be sub-human so their lives never mattered enough to be protected. A parallel could also be drawn to war propaganda, as in America it has long been considered heroic to die for your country, when it is true that many times people do not really have a choice. White American society prided itself in its morality but they failed to recognize that they would also accept human suffering and literal death so long as it was the right kind of it, and they would do this by dehumanizing whatever group stood between them and their greed. Further, in this case, Tashtego’s death by suffocation in the spermaceti would have been the right kind of death for white Americans, because society had decided that a man’s life is worth less than the money that they would make with this prized substance. Finally, as Melville does in the last sentence of the chapter, we should ask ourselves how many people in our time have “likewise fallen into Plato’s honey head, and sweetly perished there?” And how many of these deaths are we currently benefitting from? And why are we okay with that?

Short Essay: Close Reading 1

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In one interesting choice of many, Melville named two consecutive chapters the same way; chapters 26 and 27 are both called “Knights and Squires.” For the first one, he spends most of his time describing the knight in shining armor that happens to be the first mate of the Pequod: the great Starbuck. His qualities are all manly, dignified, serene, and heroic. Melville’s language is full of flourish and can get downright soppy. In chapter 27, he reveals who the other knights are, which are the second and third mate respectively, Stubb and Flask. They are not as regal as Starbuck, but they are still portrayed as dignified, rugged warriors. Then, to finish the medieval reference, Melville describes our squires, which are the three harpooneers; Queequeg, Tashtego, and Daggoo, one for every mate. At the end of this, however, Melville abruptly shifts his tone. In page 132, he writes, “Curious to tell, this imperial negro, Ahasuerus Daggoo, was the Squire of little Flask, who looked like a chess-man beside him. As for the residue of the Pequod’s company, be it said, that at the present day not one in two of the many thousand men before the mast employed in the American whale fishery, are Americans born, though pretty nearly all of the officers are. Herein it is the same with the American whale fishery as with the American army and military and merchant navies, and the engineering forces employed in the construction of the American Canals and Railroads. The same, I say, because in all these cases the native American liberally provides the brains, the rest of the world as generously supplying the muscles.” In other words, Melville initially uses medieval imagery as an analogy to build up the whaling ship hierarchies,  but we can see how in this passage he drops the curtain to reveal the exploitative nature of this and other systems our country was built on, which contrasts our romantic illusion of our nation’s greatness with the stark reality that it was built on the backs of the marginalized. 

In the first sentence of the passage, we can see how Daggoo, a Squire, is described as “imperial,” a term for royalty. He is obviously physically superior to Flask, as Melville calls Flask a “chess-man.” Having spent all the time up until now in these two chapters reinforcing the typical medieval hierarchy, Melville switches the language associated with Daggoo, who is of a lower rank, to recognize that there is nothing about Flask that should make him inherently superior to Daggoo; in fact, it should logically be the contrary. In the next sentence, however, he reveals what gives Flask authority over Daggoo, and that is that Flask is “American born.” In fact, while most whalers in America are immigrants, almost all officers are “native” Americans. This pattern repeats, Melville notes, in most other industries and systems that keep the country running, like the military or the builders of “the American Canals and Railroads.” Melville puts it eloquently in the last sentence: “in all these cases the native American liberally provides the brains, the rest of the world as generously supplying the muscles.” In other words, the working class in America is composed of native born Americans (more specifically, white Americans) who hold positions of power, and the rest (the ones who do the heavy lifting) are foreigners and first generation immigrants. Xenophobia and racism were 

It is interesting that Melville chose the analogy of knights and squires for this dynamic between mate and harpooneer. Historically, knights were heroic warriors and they did the fighting, while squires had the role of assisting them with their equipment and didn’t fight a lot despite being trained for it. In the book, the mates are called the knights when it is actually the harpooneers (the ones being called squires) who go hand to hand with Leviathan and deliver the killing blow. We have not heard of the mates actually doing anything laborious up to this point in the story, while we know the harpooneers’ role clearly. Nevertheless, Ishmael reserves most of the heroic language in chapter 26 and 27 for the mates. The mates and the harpooneers seem to have reverse orders in the analogy of knights and squires, a sarcastic commentary on the part of Melville that the system gives recognition to the wrong party. In short, the harpooneers work like knights but get the same amount of recognition as squires. Society is built on the backs of people who are treated as second rate, but their contributions go largely ignored.

The curse of overthinking

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Chapter 44, “The Chart,” gives us some insight on Ahab’s plan to find Moby Dick. He is obssessively charting a course for the Pequod that may guarantee them an encounter with the whale, but there are too many variables. We also get insight into Ahab’s fixation and how it shapes his every waking (and dreaming) moment. His thoughts are about Moby Dick alone and he is slowly consumed by them. In page 220, Melville writes, “God help thee, old man, thy thoughts have created a creature in thee; and he whose intense thinking thus makes him a Prometheus; a vulture feeds upon that heart for ever; that vulture the very creature he creates.” The mention of Prometheus is an interesting one because it highlights the consuming quality of fire, something that is evidently going on in Ahab’s mind. However, recalling the story of Prometheus, he was punished for defying the gods and giving fire to humanity, which caused him to be tortured for eternity. This chapter is presumably in Ishmael’s point of view, which means that choosing this reference purposefully paints Ahab in a heroic and tortured light, although Ahab is clearly helping no one in madly chasing the whale. Ishmael has started idolizing Ahab, specifically starting from the moment he agreed to the crazed chase for the whale, and now sees him as a type of mad intellectual, tragically cursed for thinking too much. Additionally, in the story, an eagle would eat Prometheus’ liver every night, which is parallel to the passage above, only for Ahab it’s “a vulture that feeds upon that heart forever,” and the vulture is a creature of his own making. This part is evidence that Ishmael does recognize Ahab’s part in his own suffering, and he pities him, but the tone in which he describes this still paints Ahab in a poetic light and as a kind of victim. As Ahab becomes increasingly fixated on catching the whale, Ishmael observes in wonder and admiration.

To scorn the earth

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In Chapter 13, Ishmael finally boards a watercraft, a little ferry (the Moss) that will take him and Queequeg to Nantucket. It’s interesting that this is the first direct contact with the water that he’s had since the story started, given that he’s spent so much time thinking about it. Another example of this novel refusing to begin. The moment finally comes on page 66, when they start sailing down the Acushnet river. Ishmael muses, “Gaining the more open water, the bracing breeze waxed fresh; the little Moss tossed the quick foam from her bows, as a young colt his snortings. How I snuffed that Tartar air!–how I spurned that turnpike earth!–that common highway all over dented with the marks of slavish heels and hoofs; and turned me to admire the magnanimity of the sea which will permit no records” (66). Just as he said at the beginning of the story, the ocean makes him feel better; it’s his way to cope with life. He looks back at land and he compares it to a hell of sorts, a highway pockmarked with “slavish heels and hoofs.” He relishes the openness and the fluidity of the water, “which will permit no records.” He feels free, untethered. But at what cost? Melville juxtaposes the earth with the sea and gives that idea to us through Ishmael’s perspective–a white male in 19th century America. Melville intentionally uses the phrase “slavish heels and hoofs” to refer to the marks Ishmael sees on the side of the river. The word “slavish” could simply refer to the monotonous and restraining lives of most people on land, people who prefer stability over adventure; but further, I see this is a clear reference to the reality that was slavery in America, which was coming to its boiling point at the time, and was something that Ishmael would not have been negatively affected by. In fact, he would have benefitted from it, even if indirectly. For Ishmael, it is easy to scorn the Earth and prefer the ocean over it because he has that luxury. He feels the wind in his hair and mighty freedom surges in his heart as he sails through the water, but the earth does not forget. Ishmael hates to feel tied town and chained to his unfulfilling life, but he fails to recognize there are others who are legally considered subhuman and have no choice but to live in chains. The magnanimous sea “will permit no records,” and for someone like Ishmael it is easier and more convenient to turn away from the marks of injustice that lie upon the earth.

Country-bred dandies

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In Chapter 6, “The Street,” Melville introduces us to the microcosm of New Bedford through the eyes of Ishmael. Right off the bat, he draws a parallel between Queequeg’s perceived savageness and the strange sight he encounters on the street (pg. 16). He turns his focus, however, to a specific category of men; to this group, he refers in the following way: “…scores of green Vermonters and New Hampshire men, all athirst for gain and glory in the fishery. They are mostly young, of stalwart frames; fellows who have felled forests and now seek to drop the axe and snatch the wale-lance.” (16). The visual element of the description is key to representing the naiveness, frivolity, and recklessness of these men. They are green, inexperienced, and scrawny, but also money hungry and air headed. In their hometowns they kill trees, now they are looking to kill whales. He later identifies them as “bumpkin dandies,” a new breed of spoiled brat that surpasses even city dandies in their insufferableness. Then he turns our attention toward New Bedford itself, a seemingly unremarkable piece of land that has nevertheless prospered immensely. To answer where this wealth came from he says, “Go and gaze upon the iron emblematical harpoons round yonder lofty mansion, and your question will be answered. Yes; all these brave houses and flowery gardens came from the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. One and all, they were harpooned and dragged up hither from the bottom of the sea…You must go to New Bedford to see a brilliant wedding; for, they say, they have reservoirs of oil in every house, and every night recklessly burn their lengths in spermaceti candles” (17). The description of the New Bedford community is starkly similar to that of the bumpkin dandies. Maybe dandies are out of their depth in this new town, but they are just as greedy and irresponsible as the locals. The local wealth comes from the exploitation of the ocean, just as the country people’s wealth comes from the exploitation of the earth. Although Melville doesn’t directly compare the two, it’s not coincidental that he writes of one right after the other. In reality, these bumpkin dandies come to continue the cycle of exploitation already set before them, so really, how out of place are they? I would say they are right at home, and though Ishmael doesn’t seem to notice, Melville is fully aware of it. He once again employs imagery as his strongest resource, because, by giving the reader a visual representation of wealth (the dandies and their clothes, New Bedford weddings), and contrasting it with a mental image of exploitation (“emblematical harpoons,” the axe that cuts down forests), he highlights the imminent link between them.

5 Questions for Steve Mentz

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  1. “Deterritorializing” is reminiscent of the more common (and more land-oriented) word “deconstructing,” which is often used in the humanities. Why is it important now more than ever to unlearn what we have learned?
  2. What is your favorite fact you have learned while researching water/the ocean?
  3. Do you think experiencing nature first hand (like being able to see an ice landscape in person) is an important aspect of the blue humanities?
  4. Do you think younger people (school aged children) can benefit from exposure to the blue humanities, or is it a current more suited to the environment of academia and higher education?
  5. When you were younger, what did you want to grow up to be?

Intro to Steve Mentz

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This week’s reading was interesting as usual. The blue humanities is a new and foreign concept to me, but since we have started talking about it, I am very curious to know more. I have also been attempting to consolidate a definition of it in my head; a more material idea of it. Steve Mentz writes, “I emphasize these specific oceanic margins because of my commitment to linking human-sized encounters to planetary scales. Bringing a little splash of my local Atlantic into a global scholarly conversation will keep these thoughts tangible and direct” When I read this quote, I thought it was a good example of what I understand to be the meaning of blue humanities: a current (see what I did there) that studies people’s relationship with water. Steve Mentz talks about water in his article “A poetics of planetary water: The blue humanities after John Gillis,” but makes a point of grounding (can’t escape it) his musings about this substance in a human perspective. He says that highlighting this relationship is what will keep his thoughts “tangible and direct.” It is interesting how in a conversation about fluidity, distortion, and other unstable qualities of water we find it so necessary to land these ideas onto something more solid, otherwise we won’t be able to understand them. We have to merge the familiar with the unfamiliar to be able to process new knowledge. Our thought processes aim towards finding clarity when water mostly offers distortion, and we fight against it because the water is not our home. Then again, water is transparent, and even though sometimes the ocean is so deep your eyes can’t see the bottom, when you’re there floating in the middle of the great blue, what your eyes detect underwater can only be described as a clarity. Maybe blue humanities can offer us that clarity even though it may not be in the grounded way we are used to. 

Thinking about language

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I love literature because it inevitably gets you thinking; about life, yourself, humanity, love, and so on. I also love it because the same work can mean entirely different things for two different people, or, on the flip side, help to people realize they had more in common than they thought. In that sense, reading Philip Hoare’s article makes me happy, because it shows his appreciation for this work. Phrases like, “Few books are so filled with neologisms; it’s as if Melville were frustrated by language itself, and strove to burst out of its confines,” prove my point. We don’t actually know if Melville was frustrated by language and thus invented a bunch of words, but the fact that he does is worthy of note. The invention of new words as a result of frustration is a cool concept and it gets me thinking about how language constrains our understanding of the universe. Language shapes the way we think, but it has limits; and even as someone who is bilingual, sometimes not even two languages are enough to express everything I think and feel. Anyway, I’m excited to learn some new words I’ve never seen before through this book, and hopefully they make their way into my vocabulary to help with that feeling of restriction I sometimes find myself experiencing in terms of language.

Glad to be here!

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Hello, class! My name is Adria Janelle Lopez, I’m 20 years old, and I just transferred to SDSU from Imperial Valley College. I spent my childhood in Mexicali, Baja California, and my teenage years in Calexico, California, so I am proudly a product of these two sister cities that I was raised in. My heart and the love that lives in it is split between my family, my friends, movies, music, literature, language, learning, and humanity. I think all of these things are related because they transmit empathy and help us become better human beings, and that gives me the greatest satisfaction in life. My taste in books and movies ranges from Jane Austen to Star Wars, among other things, but something I can’t handle is horror because I’m a scaredy cat. These last few years, my most listened to artist on Spotify has alternated between BTS and Arctic Monkeys, both whom I have been lucky enough to see in concert! I also like musicals and will listen to the soundtracks in the car which drives my little sister crazy (I love Funny Girl and Phantom of the Opera, to name a few). I am very excited to get into this crazy dense book and share the experience with you all. I am expecting to be blown away in the best way possible and I’m dying to see what all the fuss is about. Thanks for reading!

^^ me having fun at my birthday party