Week 15: Conscious and Unconscious Writing

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What struck me from this week’s reading was from The Anatomy of Melville’s Fame. Riegel mentions on page 200 that the recent revival of Moby Dick has been in the context of modern psychology and philosophy. He goes on to discuss debates over whether Melville is a conscious or unconscious writer, which I think is an interesting topic. This is something I’ve considered a lot; how much of creative work is conscious effort toward an idea/motif/lesson etc, versus how much is a projection of the subconscious. These ideas of the conscious and subconscious are popular in psychology (partially why this part interests me so, since psychology is my major), and are often discussed in many other classes in regards to biology, philosophy etc. However, none of these ideas were strongly present when Melville wrote this book, and I always wonder how much of books are purposefully written in a historical context. It seems Melville did write with intention in some chapters (like Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish), yet others are just abstract ideas of the ocean. Yet, from these chapters too, we can glean insight into Melville, or the political state of the U.S. at the time. This also makes me wonder how Melville wanted this book to be read. Did he write this as a political commentary? Did he write it as a love letter? This type of context would influence the conscious versus unconscious debate; if written as political commentary then perhaps all about Hawthorne is irrelevant. But if written as a love letter (since it is dedicated to Hawthorne), then what is the context of all the political commentary? Even then, is all of this analysis necessary? I think most writers don’t write to have their own lives analyzed, it is the book they want read, not themselves. Yet who a person is makes a book all the more interesting. So should we read this novel as a conscious, intentional novel? Or as a subconscious, projective novel? Does it matter, if we are just projecting our own selves onto the writing?

Week 15

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While reading through “Melville Reborn, Again and Again” by Matthew Wills, I was fascinated to learn of the perspectives and opinions between British and American criticism of Melville. Throughout the semester, one of the main ideas that has stuck with me is why this book was a failure when it was first released, but after many years it has become a staple in American literature. The idea of powerful works being ignored is something that has always fascinated me, the idea of Melville “dying unknown, forgotten, and ignored” (Wills). After reading through this novel and seeing how beautifully it was written and how strong Melville’s push of multiple cultural issues it is hard to think of him passing without knowing the worth of his work. 

As I read through “The Anatomy of Melville’s Fame” by O. W. Riegel, the reason for this failure became a little more clear. While we read Moby-Dick my understanding of its failure felt like it was based on American society not being able to accept their own wrongs and ignoring things that would call out their ways. This is clearly a current issue we have, therefore it was easy to think of this being the reason people ignored the novel. However, one aspect that interested me was the influence of British criticism on American thought. Riegel states that there was an  “unwillingness of British critics to see in Moby Dick anything more than a poorly constructed whaling story” (196). This is a novel that is certainly difficult at times and some British critics thought of it as a simply badly written whaling adventure story because they would not embrace or “recognized the possibility of a philosophical interpretation” (196). With this in mind it becomes clear why the book would fail in their eyes, Melville wrote a powerful critique and this novel is deeply rooted in the philosophical, therefore to ignore it makes this exactly what they implied. As for American criticism, it was said that “Had Americans felt more cultural pride and less inclination to grovel before British oracles, Melville might have become then, as he is now, a great hero of American national consciousness” (196). This quote is one that is referred to multiple times and it has stuck with me through the reading, the British idea of literature was held at such a high standard that American critics conformed to their ideas instead of creating their own opinions. From my understanding, this quote shows the inability for American critics to create a separation in literature from Britain and with this Melville’s novel failed. This was such a wonderful essay to read through and I am excited to hear what everyone has to say about this in class! 

Week 15: The Anatomy of Melville’s Fame

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Finally, we have some insight into why Moby Dick, may not have been as popular as Melville had hoped. The British hated it, or as O.W. Riegel puts it, “were unable to see it as “anything more than a poorly constructed whaling story(196).” His novel was “tested against the canons of unity, coherence, and emphasis (196),” and within this lens could not have had any hope of succeeding.

These criticisism’s definitely make sense, Melville tested us in class, with his ability to weave this story in every possible direction, enlightening us and then leaving us grasping through water, and debris from the deconstruction of the Pequod. We can apreciate this novel now for what it was, an intentionally experiemental novel, of which now many abound, and can point to this great American novel, as its forefather, the most experimental of all experimental novels.

Riegel’s reconstruction of how it was received by the literary community provided the context for what Melville was going up against, and why it was unappreciated: it was going against the English literary canon “tested against the canons of unity, coherence, and emphasis. (196).” However, instead of attempting to measure up to the great literary creations of authors past, Melville resisted and created something entirely new, not just a book about whaling (action), but about whaling (industry), completely reliant on the labor it gently coaxed and roughly extorted from free, enslaved, and ostracized people. He commented on the most important issues of his time, and even of ours, so many years in the future, using the novel to reflect the people he was speaking to, Americans.

Final Project Proposal

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For my final project, I have decided to focus on the topic that I wrote about for my second close reading essay, which is the critique of Christianity within Moby Dick. As we read through the novel this is something that I truly didn’t focus on much until I came into class and heard all of the different ideas from my peers. Which then caught my interest and I have started re-reading some of these chapters even closer with this idea in mind. I will be focusing my essay around chapter 17 titled “The Ramadan” and another chapter which I have ideas for but haven’t decided which I want to incorporate the most. My project will not include a creative piece, it will be an essay revolving around Melville using Ishmael as a vessel to push forward a powerful critique of Christianity through the use of Ishmael’s moments of condescending and hypocritical language. My essay will also include the two scholarly sources that will help push forward this critique. I have found a couple of sources that relate to my topic and I will be making the final decisions this week of what works best.

Final Proposal

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Thesis: Within Moby-Dick, Melville uses Ahab to portray the obsessive nature in the American people and industrialization. Using the article, “The Blue Humanities” by John R. Gillis as an example of the over whaling that almost led to sperm whale extinction. Gillis states, “people began to come back to the sea in search for a quality they felt to be missing in the new industrial environment” with that, the sea became yet another resource of humans to destroy. The obsession of killing the white whale, it is a symbol for the over industrialization that humans caused with our obsessive nature.

I still need to figure out an argument to make my thesis. Industrialization devastated the common people and the landscape. Everyone knows this, but I still need a solid argument to go along with this.

Moby Dick and the Antebellum Period – Week 15

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As was discussed numerous times during the semester, a big reason for Moby Dick “flopping” during its initial publication was because slavery alongside many of the topics that Herman Melville argues against were key factors that contributed to the social and economic aspects of the United States during that time. Moby Dick as a whole single-handedly dismantles the ideologies that the United States was built and founded upon and argues for more thoughts against these ideologies than for them, which is understandably a difficult thing for people (let alone an entire country) to grasp and work towards. Even now, with some readers of Moby Dick either not enjoying or arguing against the themes and topics that Melville incorporates into his novel, we can still see the difficulty in grasping how the United States “democracy” is not a democracy, and the overzealous and monomaniacal thinking of our president(s) contributes to a sheep-like mindset amongst the greater public, thus creating an institution that works against the United States and its people rather than for them. While reading the articles, the mention of the “American phenomenon” (Riegel, 7) made me realize how detrimental the single mindset and communal way of thinking has become for American people. We have already constructed a history that still impacts us to this day, and yet we continue to make some of the most subtle mistakes that were made in the past in present day that could lead us down a path of joint destruction just as Ahab and the crew aboard the Pequod lead themselves down.

Final Essay Proposal

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For my final project, I will close read my sailing class. I have been taking it all semester alongside Moby Dick and I think it has been a good supplemental thing to do alongside reading this novel because it has given me some (limited) perspective as to what it’s like to be at sea, and the boredom that comes along with staring out at the water. 

Thesis: Moby Dick is filled with chapters of seemingly nothing, of boredom, of lack of action. Many consist of in depth descriptions, or abstract commentary on the ocean. Melville uses these chapters to convey the emotional state that sailors found thesmelves in on these boats, where days of boredom seem to float on by, perhaps explaining both Ishmael’s lack of self and Ahab’s madness. 

Final Essay Proposal

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For this project, I will argue that Herman Melville constructs the Pequod as a microcosm of nineteenth-century American society, a confined world where racial diversity, economic ambition, and hierarchical authority collide. Using Ishamael’s description of the ship as “a Quaker ship manned by races the most dissimilar”, this essay will show how Melville compresses the contradictions of American democracy, capitalism, and power into the ship’s tight social structure. By compressing these contradictions into the tight space of a single ship, Melville suggests that the forces shaping American life—its diversity, its capitalist motives, and its susceptibility to authoritarian power—are internal structures individuals carry with them, making the ship’s eventual destruction a symbolic warning about the nation as a whole. The purpose of this essay is to demonstrate how close reading can reveal the political and cultural stakes embedded in literary form, especially when texts use constrained spaces, i.e the Pequod, to model larger social dynamics. I plan to present this work as a traditional written essay. This project reflects my ongoing interest on how literature critiques systems of power and represents social complexity. 

Final Project Proposal

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In Moby Dick, Melville presents a complicated rumination on life and America in the form of a novel about whaling and the chase of a great whale. My purpose is to explore Melville’s use of circles and circle related language as he uses it in the novel, and will be writing regular 6-8 page essay on the topic. My aim is to capture the overarching message of the novel, which seems to point to the cyclical nature of existence, a reality that is both comforting and terrifying.

Thesis statement: Throughout Moby Dick, Melville makes use of the concept of circles in his diction, imagery, and as a structural aspect in the overall narrative.

Final Project Proposal

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I am nervous about it, but I am going to write Pip into The Deep by Rivers Solomon. I believe that Melville purposefully delivered Pip to his ancestors. I can’t stop thinking about the intersection of Pip’s soul lost to the Antilles and the mermaids from the Middle Passage.

Thesis:

In Chapter 110 of Moby Dick, while Queequeg is laying in his coffin preparing for death, Pip asks a favor of him. “Seek out one Pip, who’s now been missing long: I think he’s in those far Antilles.” (522) By conveying Pip to the Antilles, Melville delivers him to his ancestors. This delivery directs focus to the savage, immoral foundations of America. This subtle critique not only assesses Christianity and capitalism, but delivering Pip to the Middle Passage critiques the values of ‘civility’ compared to so called savagery. Melville indicates that there is no such thing as civility, only justified savagery.