MOBY-DICK
#Herman_Melville
Introduction and Notes by #Carl F. Hovde
#An_epic_of_the_sea_such as no man has equalled.-D. H. Lawrence
On a previous voyage, a mysterious white whale had ripped off the leg of a sea
captian named Ahab. Now the crew of the Pequod, on a pursuit that features constant, adventure and horrendous mishaps, must follow the mad Ahab into
the abyss to satisfy his unslakeable thirst for vengeance. Narrated by the cun-ningly observant crew member Ishmael, Moby-Dick is the tale of the hunt for the elusive, omnipotent, and ultimately mystifying white whale_Moby Dick.
On its surface, Moby-Dick is a vivid documentary of life aboard a nineteenth- century whaler, a virtual encyclopedia of whales and whaling, replete with facts,
legends, and trivia that Melville had gleaned from personal experience and scores of sources. But as the quest for the whale becomes increasingly perilous, the tale works on allegorical levels, likening the whale to human greed, moral consequence, good, evil, and life itself. Who is good? The great white whale who, like Nature, asks nothing but to be left in peace? Or the bold Ahab who, like scientists, explorers, and philosophers, fearlessly probes the mysteries of the universe? Who is evil? The ferocious, man-killing sea monster? Or the revenge-obsessed madman who ignores his own better nature in his quest to kill the beast?
Scorned by critics upon its publication, Moby-Dick was publicly derided during
its author's lifetime. Yet Melville's masterpiece has outlived its initial misunder- standing to become an American classic of unquestionably epic proportions.
Carl F. Hovde taught at Columbia University for thirty-five years. An editor for the Princeton University Press edition of Henry David Thoreau, he has also written about Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry James, and William Faulkner.
