Throughout the chapter, there is one passage that particularly caught my attention. It is chapter 75, where Ishmael is doing a deep dive-in on the Right Whale’s Head. The passage states, “But if this whale be a king, he is a very sulky looking fellow to grace a diadem. Look at that hanging lower lip! What a huge sulk and pout is there! A sulk and pout, by carpenter’s measurements, about twenty-feet long and five-feet deep; a sulk and pout that will yield you some 500 gallons of oil and more.” (Melville 365). This passage is very interesting to me because it reminds me of an Anthropology class where I was learning about sustainability, where fishermen have their own alternative way to hunt fish without exploiting its species till the point of extinction. The reason why fishes have been on the verge of extinction in today’s society is because humans have been exploiting the ocean for years. We hunt for food, for fish oil, and other vitamins that benefit us, and we exploit them by exceeding the limits every single day. When I look at this passage, I believe the same concept applies to whales. They produced a huge amount of oil equivalent to just one whale, to be exact it’s at least 500 gallons of oil and more. I believe Melville is trying to tell readers how the sulking/pouting whale represents all of the fishes that went extinct in today’s society. Back then, fishes were insanely large, but in today’s society, their sizes reduced significantly. This tells us that humans have purposefully hunted fishes over the limits, and now there are no large fish left to produce. I believe whales are in the same situation because the whale offers oil as an opportunity for humans to exploit. With that being said, the fishes (including the whales) are on the verge of extinction, and the ocean is extremely unsustainable since humans keep exploiting it. As a result, we won’t have anything left to hunt, and all of the species will go extinct. Melville brought in a really good point of how this novel is not just about whales, but about sustainability/ unsustainability to all the fish species.
Moby-Dick
ECL 522: Fall 2025. Professor Pressman
Hi Mylo! Sustainably has been a very important concept for centuries. I feel like in this chapter in particular Melville uses Ishmael as a way to examine the whaling industry as a part of capitalisms destructive appetite. There is a type of domination over nature that whalers have and the pursuit of profit blinds them from their ecological consequences of their actions. I feel like Melville uses this chapter, as well as the previous one, as a critique on capitalism and the selfish exploitation that you talked about. Thank you for sharing!
Hi Mylo! I enjoyed reading through your blog post! This chapter also grabbed my attention! I love all of the details that Melville shows us as he describes the whale! The industry was very profitable, but in the end also took out a lot of the whale population, which was not good for the oceans. Those effects can still be seen, which is very sad. Thank you for posting about this subject, which is brought up in the book; it is a very important one that can still be relevant today.