Tag Archives: week 3

”What Moby-Dick Means to Me”

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While reading Hoare’s article, it made me more eager to get started on Moby Dick. This man hypes up Melville and shows major appreciation for the novel. So, I am very excited to begin reading it. 

In Hoare’s article, he writes that Moby Dick should not be treated as a regular novel because it is more than just words on a page. It allows the audience to gain a better understanding of the relationship between man and nature. He says “It’s more an act of transference, of ideas and evocations hung around the vast and unknowable shape of the whale, an extended musing on the strange meeting of human history and natural history.” Moby Dick makes the reader conscious and encourages the reader to think deeper on what the whale exactly stands for, and what man’s relation with nature can be like. The relationship between man and nature can be seen as obsessive for example. But it is entirely up the reader to interpret the story and characters how they see fit. I know for me personally, figuring out what means what and trying to figure out the deeper meaning can be difficult sometimes. Another thing I wanted to add is, I find it interesting how Moby Dick is open for interpretation. In some previous English classes, while reading a book, the teacher usually gives us the main point or theme of the story and I had to find evidence to back that point up. However, I am interested in seeing how I navigate this novel and seeing what I take from it. 

Hoare also states that Moby Dick “stands both as a historical reference for the great age of Yankee whaling and as a work of imagination in which whales become avatars as much as they are real animals.” In the 19th century, whaling was a big deal and whale oil was a hot commodity. So, Moby Dick is also able to provide major historical context. Even though it is fiction, you can still get an idea of what whaling was like and of what sea life was like then. Also seen in this quote here, Hoare mentions using your imagination for the whale and seeing what they represent. And, while yes, Moby Dick is a work of fiction, the fictional characters can symbolize and mean much more rather than being seen as just an animal/person. 

What “What ‘Moby-Dick’ Means to Me” Means to Me

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I know that this post falls after the deadline, but I’m writing it more to jot down my ideas and key takeaways from the readings and see if anyone else can relate. When Hoare wrote that “‘Moby-Dick’ is not a novel,” but “an act of transference, of ideas and evocations hung around the vast and unknowable shape of the whale, an extended musing on the strange meeting of human history and natural history,” it kind of clicked for me. It reminds me of our first day of the semester, when most of us were confessing to feeling overwhelmed before even starting the novel. Hoare’s comment connects to how Melville, as an author, didn’t write the novel as just a book, but a time capsule of the ideas of the 19th century. Emerson, whom we’ve talked about influencing Melville, urged 20th-century scholars to think for themselves and to work towards intellectual development constantly. This singular quote from this article began a domino effect on how to better approach Moby Dick as an intimidated reader. Instead of reading Moby Dick as a novel like Pride and Prejudice (where the details aren’t elaborated on too extensively and it’s very specifically plot-focused instead of detail-focused), it’s meant to be interpreted, not merely clicked off on my Goodreads “read” shelf.

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.

“The Blue Humanities”

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I’m fascinated with this week’s reading, ” The Blue Humanities,” this article really stood out to me, especially this quote by: Jules Verne, who wrote: “The human mind delights in grand visions of supernatural beings. And the sea is their very best medium, the only environment in which such giants . . . can be produced and developed.” The fact that he mentions this on how the ocean can create such imaginative beings and creations of whatever comes to mind by the power of ‘nature’ is truly marvelous. Getting a bit off topic, as a child I was obsessed with anything of the ocean: animals, shells, sea creatures, mythical sea creatures, etc. Anything that involved the ocean I would write and create stories about it. Even as an adult I sometimes write and describe the ocean as an actual “human being” with emotions. The sea is full of mystery, wonder, power, curiosity in many aspects, and now being considered as a piece of art and inspiration to others for creativity and escape. Everyday people create stories and songs involving the power of nature to be used as an escape and appreciation, Melville being inspired by the ocean and thus came the creation of Moby-Dick, by wanting us to feel inspired by it.

Week 3: Moby-Dick still intimidates me

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As a person who had a hard time reading past the first chapters of Moby-Dick, I still feel uneasy about getting into this novel. This behemoth of a story has an absurd amount of chapters, way more than expected for a typical novel, and its 800-page count is very intimidating for people who like to read medium-length novels like me. However, reading Philip Hoare’s article What “Moby-Dick” Means to Me at least eased these feelings of discomfort of having to read a difficult book in a class about reading a difficult book. Here are my thoughts while reading through the article:

Hoare frames Moby-Dick as “an act of transference, of ideas and evocations hung around the vast and unknowable shape of the whale, an extended musing on the strange meeting of human history and natural history.” instead of an actual novel. As of writing this (I got through Chapter 1 and part of chapter 2), I’d probably agree with Hoare. A good portion of the first few chapters of Moby-Dick is Ishmael monologuing about the city and his preparations before his whaling journey–at least, that’s what it looks like to the amateur reader. The book is more than 170 years old, and the English language has changed since then, and that probably explains why the book was difficult for its time. Either that, or this generation is not used to reading books as much as older generations do.

Moving on, Hoare talks about what reading Moby-Dick feels like to him: it feels like a drug that, when “taken” (read), makes him travel backward in time to the point where reading it is like reading “something that was written before books were invented” despite being modern. Reading that part of the article makes me even more curious as to why this work of literature is so acclaimed and influential. The first two chapters seem like Ishmael’s stream of consciousness, describing his surroundings as if they were parts of a painting. My opinion of this book may change when we all start reading it as a class later on.

Moby-Dick was definitely the novel of novels at its time, and reading about how the book had such an impact on a person’s life clued me in as to what to expect from a novel that’s split into many chapters and pages. The book is difficult, yes, but it’s a good way to challenge oneself especially after not reading for so long. Maybe when we start diving into the novel (no pun intended), we’ll see what Moby-Dick means to us.

“Blue Humanities” and Modern Day Obsession with the Ocean

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This week while reading “The Blue Humanities”, this particular tidbit stood out to me: “A shift in attention from land to sea is under way in several fields simultaneously.” The piece goes on to explain how differing scientific fields have now shifted to an oceanic point of view, this quotation in particular got me thinking about how the ocean and all it offers, both real and imagined, are portrayed in popular culture.

Now, I’m going to be honest here. I grew up without cable, so I didn’t grow up with many popular “oceanic” tv shows, except for shows that talked about all kinds of animals, such as “Wild Kratts”. But in middle school, I began to have an obsession over mermaids. I was always binging “H2O” and “Mako Mermaids”, not to mention reading books with mermaids at the forefront, such as “Siren” by Kira Cass. And, as I look back at my pre-teen self, I realized how I romanticized the creatures. Because, in reality, the mythology behind them is so much more interesting than the “dumbed down” version of them in popular culture. Am I saying that these pieces are bad? Not by any means! But they do not portray mermaids at their core. Classically speaking, mermaids lured sailors to their deaths. And, while these pieces do portray mermaids as having extraordinary singing ability, they don’t portray the true deadliness of that power. (Which does make sense, as most of these are for kids. And who wants their child to watch sailors drown?)

That’s why nowadays I am more drawn into media that portrays mermaids more like the “monster” they are in old mythology, such as in ” Into the Drowning Deep” by Mira Grant. When you really get more in depth on the creatures, I find said media to be much more interesting, and feel much more real.

But it’s not only mermaids that have become main stream pop culture, but marine veterinarians as well. My best friend growing up’s favorite movie was “Dolphin Tale”. And now she’s studying to become a Wildlife Vet! This pop culture phenomenon is inspiring thousands of people to take an interest in oceans. While the more “dumbed-down” versions of ocean mythology are what have gained popularity, at least in main stream media, they have and will inspire future scientists and artists.

“Blackfish” also comes to mind. A group of activists fighting for the Ocean animals within the Sea World parks to be released into the wild, or, at the very least, gain better living conditions. We now value ocean life more than ever!

And what’s even more amazing is how the re-emergence of “Moby Dick” really started all of it! Scholars critiquing the whaling industry took center stage, pointing out it’s brutality. Because the process is described so in depth within the novel, we, as readers, are able to truly understand it. It shows how far we have come with how we treat our sea-faring friends, both within the real world, and with how we portray them within the pages of a book.

The Blue Humanities – John R. Gillis

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I think what I connected to the most in John R. Gillis’ article The Blue Humanities, was his understanding of the way in which we as people get curious. It seems to almost be in human nature to want to understand what is unknown. We have always put our dreams into the vast unexplored spaces of the universe, i.e. space, unexplored land, etc, and the ocean is not an exception to that. The quote “Dreams and nightmares that had previously been projected on terrestrial landscapes were now invested in seascapes. Even as the oceans became an object of science, they produced new myths.” is one that I think reflects this perfectly. As we explore the sea more and more, it just becomes more apparent that there is so much of it that will potentially not even be explored in our lifetime, and this is what intrigues people. The unknown world that exists simultaneously with us creates an endless desire to understand it within people because it allows us to imagine what could possibly be living among us. It’s different from just reading a fairytale or fantasy book, this is stuff that could possibly be real and the less we know the more we want to. I think this concept also resonates with and connects to what Emerson was saying in his speech about going out and exploring nature in order to learn. The desire to understand the world around us and create ideas of what might be in the world around us allows us to become more independent thinkers. This allows our brains to be stimulated in a completely different way than just reading and understanding someone else’s point of view.

Melville was a genius (and maybe a time traveler)

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After reading the article, “What ‘Moby-Dick’ Means to Me” by Philip Hoare, I’m convinced that Herman Melville was a genius who was way ahead of his time (which is why he could also be a time traveler). This article really gave me great insight into the novel and Melville himself, and learning of the influence that the novel has far after Melville passed away shows that his work has clearly reached across many different generations. It was fascinating to learn that a prow had to be built on the pulpit in the New Bedford Bethel because of how many people were expecting it to be there after reading Moby-Dick. The amount of detail that is contained within the novel is also something I’ve heard so much about, both in this article and in class, and it really shows how much effort Melville put into his piece of art.

In the article, Hoare writes, “To my mind, there are only two other works with which it bears comparison: Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ (1818), and Emily Brontë’s ‘Wuthering Heights’ (1847). The former, in its own witness to one man’s obsessive interference with nature, was a direct influence on Melville.” Obsession with nature and the idea of conquering it has been and always will be in human nature. I’m sure Melville’s own experiences bled through the novel, and there’s no doubt that his work in a way served somewhat as a response to his journeys on the sea.

I think what fascinated me most in this article, was learning about how Moby-Dick wasn’t truly appreciated until decades after Melville’s death. “In 1923, D. H. Lawrence published his idiosyncratic, if not faintly crazy, ‘Studies in Classic American Literature.’ Lawrence proclaimed Melville to be ‘a futurist long before futurism found paint,’ the author of “one of the strangest and most wonderful books in the world.” The words “a futurist long before futurism found paint,” really stick out to me as it shows how Melville was able to write a novel whose words can be reached long after it’s publishing year. To learn about his genius and his ability to create work that can be appreciated for over a century, as well as seeing themes of his novel still being prevalent in the modern world, really excites me to begin reading Moby-Dick.

Man’s Obsessiveness with Nature in ‘What Moby Dick Means to Me’

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What caught my eye in this article by Hoare, were the two novels compared to Moby Dick: Frankenstein and Wuthering Heights.

He says: “…the former (Wuthering Heights) in its own witness to one man’s obsessive interference with nature, was a direct influence on Melville…)

I agree with Hoare’s choices on novels here. It is true that Shelley and Brontë introduce us to worlds where man’s unrelenting obsession with the natural world can both serve as a tool to further understand the “sublime” or for worse, to arrive at the merciless wilderness where only the strong survive. In short, nature contains the potentialities for savagery but also grace. I also think it is interesting that all three novels were conceived at a time period between “the primeval old and and the impossibly new, between an abiding sense of certitude and the dissembling future.”

I found a compelling passage from Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach”:

…For the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain“

This points to the pessimistic view of the world that Victorians had as they tried to understand the natural world but arrived at a strong notion of uncertainty, closely tied to the understandings of faith and nature.

Returning to Our Beginnings – John Gillis’s article “The Blue Humanities”

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In his 2013 essay The Blue Humanities, John Gillis writes about the seemingly profound connection between modern Western culture and the sea. He writes, “The sea lurks in the imaginations of millions, if not billions, of people who will never test its waters. It is forever in our dreams and nightmares…” This line resonates with me on many levels. It broadly captures a paradox that speaks deeply: as our direct interaction with the sea becomes rarer, fewer people make their living from it; it gains a symbolic presence instead. For me, this mirrors how we often romanticize or maybe mythologize experiences that we have grown disconnected from.

I think that Gillis’s observations throughout his article perfectly capture the transition many of us have made: the more removed we become from it, the more the sea inhabits our dreams, our art, and our sense of wonder and curiosity. There’s also a psychological aspect to this: the more we lose direct contact with something, the more room there is for our imagination to fill in. The sea becomes less a physical place and more a canvas for freedom, or danger, depth, and mystery. Gillis points out that for much of Western history, writers and artists hardly looked at the water at all. Instead, it was just the gap between coasts. A space one had to cross in order to reach land. Artists painted the boats or animals within the waters, but not the waters themselves. Only when people no longer had to live on or by the ocean daily did it seem to become visible in new ways.

Another passage that struck me comes when Gillis writes: “Pristine nature, now in short supply in industrialized heartlands, found refuge in the oceans, while the mystery once associated with terra incognita relocated to the deeps. Simultaneously, the sublime, previously associated with mountains and forests, came to be associated with wild water.” This moment helped me to see how cultural ideas about beauty, wilderness, and awe are not fixed; they actually do shift as our environments change. Once people had cut down forests, climbed mountains, and mapped the land, the mystery they so desperately wanted was no longer available, so it had to be sought elsewhere: the sea.

I find this meaningful because it speaks to the way humans seem to always be searching for spaces that remind us of our smallness. I have the same feeling when standing next to the ocean—that feeling of insignificance but amazement. Gillis’s point helped me see that the sea is not just a physical reality but also a vessel for what we may have lost on land. The need for untouched beauty and mystery seems to stay with the ocean.