Community Chat

[Oznell]

This is the kind of tiny historical detail that always grabs me.  On January 3, 1841, titanic American writer Herman Melville ("Moby D i c k",  "Billy Budd",  "Bartleby the Scrivener")  left New Bedford, Massachusetts, heading for the South Seas.  The New Bedford Whaling Museum online site assures us it was a "cold, blustery day" for the start of his voyage.  Ha.  No surprise there!

(At this point he was a 'regular' guy, not a world-famous author.  I didn't know that his childhood encounter with scarlet fever had impaired his eyesight. That didn't stop him from shipping out to distant points on the globe.)

I wonder what ran through Melville's fecund mind as he pulled away from New England's gray, icy shore, heading to tropical, palm-thronged climes...

His ship, the 'Acushnet', landed in Polynesia, where he participated in a mutiny.  After escaping from jail, he racketed around the islands for a few years.  In 1846, his first book, the travel narrative "Typee" appeared, and his stellar literary career was launched.

What an adventurer!

[alicedee]

@Oznell Embarrassed to say I've never read any Melville books (Typee shows up in my crossword puzzles occasionally, though!).  

That will be one of my new year resolutions...I am going to read one of his books!

[Vivian]

I took a coursein 19th century American literature when I was an undergraduate. We read Moby D, which I had read in high school, and Bartley The Scrivener, which still stays with me all these years later. If someone asked me to forget that amazing story, I'd say, "I prefer not to."

[bathina]

Whalers from the east coast had exhausted the whale supply and had to travel to the south seas to hunt. These journeys took several years. There is an excellent book called In the Heart of the Sea, which tells about a whaling adventure that led to an entire ship(The whaleship Essex)being attacked and sunk by an angry whale in the South Pacific. Only a handful of men made it back to Nantucket after being adrift for months before being rescued. This was reported extensively during Melville's time in New Bedford and was the basis for his book Moby D ick. If you have a chance to read the book, do it. Its fascinating.

[golding76]

One of my most beloved novellas is Melville's Billy Budd.  To this day, whenever I witness someone acting against another from what I perceive as envy as they seek to somehow  ruin the life of another, I think of that innocent "angel of God," Billy Budd.

What a lesson in how truth can be twisted and common moral and legal structures subverted.  

Billy, with his physical beauty and pure innocence, always remains with me as an example of a lamb sacrificed to mankind's lesser instincts.

[PamfromCT]

I am going to note this and discuss with two people close to me whose education focused on the classics.  The first, my DB, an English undergrad degree, who remembers everything,

chapter and verse.  He has a friend, two degrees in English, who is a retired teacher.  The second, a dear friend of mine,

two degrees in English, a retired teacher.  

That was was not the path I followed, but I feel blessed to be surrounded by these wonderful people.  The lessons learned and examples of human behavior in all situations, all through works of literature.  I am still learning!

[Oznell]

Very cool resolution, @alicedee!

[Susan in California]

@OznellThanks for this post.

The July 29, 2019 New Yorker magazine had

an interesting article about Melville, "Ahab at Home".

I hope you get a chance to read it.

[Drythe]

I often think of this Whale.