Hearken!
Before me there is a book, at once languid in its eloquence, and deceptive in its poignancy; bold in its exploration of the human experience, and narrowly constrained by its dimension. Experiencing Herman Melville’s florid prose leaves this reviewer destitute of erudition; both beguiled and inadequate before the preponderance of keys laid out in front of him. The dearth of knowledge with which I am equipped beleaguers my attempt to assess this wondrous and weighty tome. Moby Dick is a clarion singing in the darkness, beckoning those who aspire to witness a work of singular greatness.
Reading Moby Dick is like drifting endlessly on a roiling ocean. Time is immaterial, and the particularities of the experience fade into an undulating morass of meditative tranquility counterpointed by impassioned reverence for the leviathan. I am in awe of this book. It has altered the very language I use to express myself; Melville’s words have sublimated my soul, and sought to morph how I think, how I talk, and how I write.
To experience the poetry here! To be subsumed by the crushing waves of this impassioned encomium to the sea. Nary a chapter passes that I don’t stop and savor the words that seem, like long-sought water to the mouth of a stranded seaman, to rejuvenate and return life to the weary. There is heaven, in these pages. This book is why I read.
I bought an old, musty copy of Moby Dick from my local rare book dealer when I was a teenager. I grew up on Poe and Dostoevsky, Lovecraft and Steinbeck; I loved classic literature, and had every intention of reading Moby Dick. But the language was so dense, and the descriptions of cetalogy were so dry. I later found Tolkien, which led to Robert Jordan and Tad Williams and George R.R. Martin. Like so many aspirations of the distracted, Moby Dick slowly receded from my view until it was but a distant memory of youth. The ink that traced half-remembered patterns across the bone-white pages of my old and forgotten copy were like a faded tattoo on the pallid skin of a lonely and abandoned grandparent. It called to me, unanswered and ambivalent; its despair was a foreign tongue to me, and one for which I had no translation.
Until I found In the Heart of the Sea. The story of the whaleship Essex awoke in me a desire to conquer the behemoth that has haunted me lo these last 15 years: that old, tattered copy of Moby Dick. Pleading; reaching out to me, as though to a life raft that could serve as its final succor. But in answering its beacon, I found my own salvation. The experience of reading this book – at times encyclopedic, at times Shakespearean, at times Biblical – was like no other in the whole of my existence. I am both bewildered by its munificence and aghast at how long it sat on my shelf, alone and distraught.
Read this book. Read it to counteract the drudgery under which we are daily subsumed. Read it because we all to often shirk what is good for the ease of what is readily attainable. Read it so that this paragon of literary virtue is never quelled by the ubiquity of pulp, or sacrificially offered to the vicissitudes of pop cultural insatiability. Read it so that the contrivance of my purple prose will not be wasted on the ether that fills these interconnected tubes we call the internet.
With no reticence do I declare this the most beautiful novel ever written by an American.
If I were able to write a comment as eloquent and perfect as this review, I would consider myself lucky. Well done, sir!
Well, thank you.
Your first paragraph of this review makes me consider reading Moby-Dick which I have never considered before. Congrats on a beautiful review.
I’ll count that as a victory. If I could recommend one book to anyone, it would be this one.
Thank you.
I yield the field, Ingres77. Salutations and congratulations are required beyond a doubt. My humble efforts cannot compare to the heartfelt verbiage shared with us here.
Gorgeous review. I’ve been intimidated by this book for years. May have to summon my courage and take it on now. Have you read Dan Simmons, The Terror? Without having read Moby Dick to completion I’ve always thought those 2 books were at least cousins to each other in theme and language.
I’ve not read Dan Simmons at all. The books never jumped from the shelves for me.
But I’d be willing to check it out if it at all bears similarity to this.
Thanks!
Your review is marvellous, and I’m in awe of your mastery of vocabulary. Still never going to read the book, unless you count the ten page, ten word board book illustrated with felt puppets that my nephew had (the absolute highlight being the page showing Ahab and his peg leg captioned beautifully with the word “Leg”). It always struck me as the archetypal “boy book”. I’m sure it’s a wonderful reading experience, but I know myself well enough to know I’d be bored witless by it. I forced myself through Anna Karenina a few years ago. That at least has tragic romance and balls and Russian aristocracy (but mostly farming and pointless explorations of politics – SO dull). It’s referenced quite a bit in Mike Carey’s The Unwritten series, though. Does that count?
There are so few contexts which allow for this kind of writing. Considering this is how the book was written, I didn’t think it would read as overly pretentious.
Your impression of the book isn’t wrong. I can only remember one woman in the book, and she does not have a significant role.
With that said, it didn’t strike me as overtly “masculine”. Any more than, say, All Quiet on the Western Front, at least.
I can understand why it might not be interesting, though. The descriptions of whales and the whaling industry literally make up half this book, I think. If the writing weren’t so beautiful, I wouldn’t have finished it.
Fantastic review. I also read Moby Dick after reading In the Heart of the Sea. I did have to push through it at points, but there were some sentences that were just beautiful. My copy had post-it notes all over it. And I think I appreciated the sections that really stuck out to me more for having to read through some of the more boring descriptions.
That this was a bit of a chore (even if it was a pleasing one) is certainly a contributing factor in how long it’ll last with me.
I’m reading John Scalzi’s Old Man’s War series, and find them highly enjoyable. But I forget all but the generalities (and I haven’t even started book 6 yet).
Moby Dick, though? The memories are vivid; like the face of an old, familiar friend.