Moby-Dick (1851) is a novel by Herman Melville. While some characters only appear in the shore-based chapters at the beginning of the book, and others are captains and crewmembers of other ships, the majority of the characters are officers or crewmembers of the whaling ship, Pequod .
Ishmael is the narrator of the book. He recounts the whaling voyage led by Captain Ahab while also explaining the history and mechanics of whaling and attempting to promote the nobility of the trade. He primarily observes the major events of the novel as opposed to being an active participant in them. In the epilogue, it is revealed that Ishmael was the only survivor of the sinking of the Pequod. The name Ishmael has come to symbolize orphans, exiles, and social outcasts in reference to the biblical character from which his name is taken. [1]
Captain Ahab is the tyrannical captain of Pequod. Prior to the events of the novel, Captain Ahab lost his leg while hunting Moby Dick, leading to a monomaniacal desire in Ahab to kill the "White Whale". It is his obsession with Moby Dick that dooms Pequod and her crew, with Ishmael as the sole survivor. Following his introduction, Ahab overtakes Ishmael as the central figure of the book. He is the main protagonist of the novel.
The title character is a giant, largely white bull sperm whale and arguably the main antagonist of the novel.
A former whaler who is a preacher in the New Bedford Whaleman's Chapel.
The character Elijah (named for the Biblical prophet Elijah), on learning that Ishmael and Queequeg have signed onto Ahab's ship, asks, "Anything down there about your souls?" When Ishmael reacts with surprise, Elijah continues:
Oh, perhaps you hav'n't got any," he said quickly. "No matter though, I know many chaps that hav'n't got any — good luck to 'em; and they are all the better off for it. A soul's a sort of a fifth wheel to a wagon."
— Moby-Dick, Ch. 19 [2]
Later in the conversation, Elijah adds:
Well, well, what's signed, is signed; and what's to be, will be; and then again, perhaps it wont be, after all. Any how, it's all fixed and arranged a'ready; and some sailors or other must go with him, I suppose; as well these as any other men, God pity 'em! Morning to ye, shipmates, morning; the ineffable heavens bless ye; I'm sorry I stopped ye.
— Moby-Dick, Ch. 19 [2]
The principal owners of the Pequod, two well-to-do Quaker retired whaling captains. Both have names taken from the Bible: Peleg, and Bildad. Peleg served as first mate under Ahab on the Pequod before obtaining his own command, and is responsible for all her whalebone embellishment.
The crew is international, having constituents from both the United States and rest of the world. Chapter 40, "Midnight, Forecastle," highlights, in its stage-play manner (in Shakespearean style), the striking variety in the sailors' origins. A partial list of the speakers includes sailors from the Isle of Man, France, Iceland, the Netherlands, the Azores, Sicily and Malta, China, Chile, Denmark, Portugal, India, England, Spain, and Ireland.
Although in fact 44 members of the crew are mentioned, in the final chapters Melville writes three times that there are 30 crewmembers. [3] Since there were thirty states in the union at the time, it has been suggested that, in its diversity, the Pequod was a metaphor for the 'American ship of state'. [4]
The three mates of the Pequod are all from New England.
The young chief mate. A thoughtful and intellectual Quaker from Nantucket. He is married with a son. Such is his desire to return to them that, when nearly reaching the last leg of their quest for Moby Dick, he considers arresting or even killing Ahab with a loaded musket, and turning the ship back for home. Starbuck is alone among the crew in objecting to Ahab's quest, declaring it madness to want revenge on an animal, which lacks reason; such a desire is blasphemous to his Quaker religion. Starbuck advocates continuing the more mundane pursuit of whales for their oil. But he lacks the support of the crew in his opposition to Ahab, and is unable to persuade them to turn back. Despite his misgivings, he feels himself bound by his obligations to obey the captain. Starbuck was an important Quaker family name on Nantucket, and there were dozens of actual whalemen of this period named Starbuck, as evidenced by the name of Starbuck Island in the South Pacific whaling grounds.
The second mate. From Cape Cod, always seems to have a pipe in his mouth and a smile on his face. "Good-humored, easy, and careless, he presided over his whaleboat as if the most deadly encounter were but a dinner, and his crew all invited guests" (Moby-Dick, Ch. 27). Although he is not an educated man, Stubb is remarkably articulate, and during whale hunts keeps up an imaginative patter reminiscent of that of some characters in Shakespeare. Scholarly portrayals range from that of an optimistic simpleton to a paragon of lived philosophic wisdom. [5]
The third mate. A short, stout man hailing from Martha's Vineyard, he approaches the practice of whaling as if trying to avenge some deep offense the whales have done him. Flask is nicknamed "King-Post" by the crew, as his physical stature reminds them of this short, strong timber that is often used to brace ships and structures.
The harpooneers of the Pequod are non-Christians from various parts of the world. Each serves on a mate's boat.
Hails from the fictional island of Rokovoko in the South Seas, inhabited by a cannibal tribe, and is the son of the chief of his tribe. He is an extremely skillful harpooneer and a strong swimmer. He and Ishmael bond early in the novel, when they share a bed before leaving for Nantucket. He is described as existing in a state between 'civilized' and 'savage', with his extensive tattoos at first frightening and then fascinating Ishmael. Queequeg is the harpooneer on Starbuck's boat, where Ishmael is also an oarsman. Queequeg and Ishmael are deeply intimate at the beginning of the novel (with Queequeg going so far in Chapter 10 as to declare the two of them 'married'), but they are separated on board the Pequod, with Ishmael working before the mast as a common sailor and Queequeg keeping a more privileged position aft.
A Gay Head (Wampanoag) Native American harpooneer. The personification of the hunter, he turns from hunting land animals to hunting whales. Tashtego is the harpooneer on Stubb's boat.
A tall (6' 5") West African harpooneer with a noble, graceful bearing. He is the harpooneer on Flask's boat. His height and placid demeanor contrast humorously with Flask's short stature and irascibility.
Harpooneer on Ahab's boat. He is of Indian Zoroastrian ("Parsee") descent, and is described as having lived in China. When the Pequod sets sail, Fedallah is hidden on board with the crew of Ahab's boat; he emerges only when the boats are first lowered to pursue a whale. Fedallah is referred to in the text as Ahab's "Dark Shadow." Ishmael calls him a "fire worshipper" and the crew speculates that he is a devil in man's disguise. He is the source of a variety of prophecies regarding Ahab and his hunt for Moby Dick, including one about the manner of Ahab's death: "Hemp only can kill thee." This prophecy later comes true in the final chapter, when a harpoon rope wraps around Ahab's neck and drags him into the sea, leading to his death by drowning.
Pip (nicknamed "Pippin", but "Pip" for short). An African-American youth said to be from Tolland County, Connecticut, although he is referred to as "Alabama Boy". He is "the most insignificant of the Pequod's crew". Because he is physically slight, he is made a ship-keeper (a sailor who stays aboard the ship while its whaleboats go out). Ishmael contrasts him with the "dull and torpid in his intellects" — and paler and much older — steward Dough-Boy, describing Pip as "over tender-hearted" but "at bottom very bright, with that pleasant, genial, jolly brightness peculiar to his tribe". Ishmael goes so far as to chastise the reader: "Nor smile so, while I write that this little black was brilliant, for even blackness has its brilliancy; behold yon lustrous ebony, paneled in king's cabinets". [6]
The after-oarsman on Stubb's boat is injured, however, so Pip is temporarily reassigned to Stubb's whaleboat crew. The first time out, Pip jumps from the boat, causing Stubb and Tashtego to lose their already-harpooned whale. Tashtego and the rest of the crew are furious; Stubb chides him "officially" and "unofficially", even raising the specter of slavery: "A whale would sell for thirty times what you would, Pip, in Alabama". The next time a whale is sighted, Pip again jumps overboard and is left stranded in the "awful lonesomeness" of the sea while Stubb's and the others' boats are dragged along by their harpooned whales. By the time he is rescued, he has become (at least to the other sailors) "an idiot", "mad". Ishmael, however, thought Pip had a mystical experience: "So man's insanity is heaven's sense". Pip and his experience are crucial because they serve as foreshadowing, in Ishmael's words, "providing the sometimes madly merry and predestinated craft with a living and ever accompanying prophecy of whatever shattered sequel might prove her own". Pip's madness is full of poetry and eloquence; he is reminiscent of Tom in King Lear . [6] Ahab later sympathizes with Pip and takes the young boy under his wing.
Bulkington is a handsome, popular mariner whom Ishmael encounters briefly at the Spouter Inn in New Bedford (Chapter 3), when he has just returned from a four year long voyage. Later, Ishmael finds that he is also a member of the crew of the Pequod. He is the subject of Chapter 23, "The Lee Shore", but does not appear in the rest of the novel.
The pale, nervous steward of the ship.
The ship's cook. A very old, half-deaf African-American with bad knees, he is presented in the chapter "Stubb's Supper" at some length. Stubb good-humoredly takes him to task on how to prepare a variety of dishes from the whale's carcass, then has him preach an admonishing sermon to the sharks gorging themselves on its blubber.
The ship's blacksmith. Ahab has Perth forge a special harpoon that he carries into the final confrontation with Moby Dick. Perth is one of the few characters whose previous life is described in much detail: his life ashore has been ruined by alcoholism.
The unnamed ship's carpenter, responsible for repairs to boats and other equipment. After Ahab's prosthetic leg is damaged, he has the carpenter fashion a replacement from the sections of whalebone in storage, then calls on Perth to forge a set of fittings for it.
Oldest member of the crew. He is "popularly invested with preternatural powers of discernment", has "studied signs", and is given to dark prophecies. His age and origin on the Isle of Man are the subject of one of Ahab's commentaries on the nature of man in Chapter 125, "The Log and Line".
Boomer commands the Samuel Enderby of London, one of the ships that Ahab encounters at sea. He has not only seen Moby Dick recently, but lost his arm to him in a previous attack. Like Ahab, he has replaced the missing limb with a prosthesis made of sperm whale bone, in his case a mallet. Ahab immediately assumes he has found a kindred spirit in his thirst for vengeance, but Boomer is yet another representation of the duality to be found throughout the novel; in this instance, a sane and rational counterpart to Ahab. While Boomer also anthropomorphizes Moby Dick, describing the "boiling rage" the whale seemed to be in when Boomer attempted to capture him, he has easily come to terms with losing his arm, and harbors no ill-will against Moby Dick, advising Ahab to abandon the pursuit. The Enderby's doctor provides solid reasoning for this attitude, informing the gathering:
Do you know, gentlemen, that the digestive organs of the whale are so inscrutably constructed by Divine Providence, that it is quite impossible for him to completely digest even a man's arm? And he knows it too. So that what you take for the White Whale's malice is only his awkwardness. For he never means to swallow a single limb; he only thinks to terrify by feints.
— Moby-Dick, Ch. 100
Boomer jokingly tells a long yarn about the loss of his arm; this attitude, coupled with a lack of urgency in telling where he sighted Moby Dick, infuriates Ahab, leading Boomer to query, "Is your captain crazy?" Ahab immediately quits the Enderby and is so hasty in his return to the Pequod that he cracks and splinters his whalebone leg, then further damages it in admonishing the helmsman. While appearing to be whole, the leg is badly damaged and cannot be trusted; it now serves as metaphor for its wearer.
Derick de Deer is a German captain in command of the whaling ship Jungfrau (Virgin). Melville disparages the whaling prowess of both de Deer and Germans generally. De Deer's ship has succeeded in capturing no whales, so he begs the Pequod's crew for oil for the ship's lamps. During this transaction, whales are sighted and the crews of both boats pursue, de Deer trying (unsuccessfully) to hinder the rival crews. De Deer is last seen pursuing a fin whale, according to Melville too swift a swimmer to be captured by 19th-century whalers.
The Pequod encounters a number of other whaling ships in the course of her voyage. The captains are not named, but some play significant minor roles:
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale is an 1851 novel by American writer Herman Melville. The book is the sailor Ishmael's narrative of the maniacal quest of Ahab, captain of the whaling ship Pequod, for vengeance against Moby Dick, the giant white sperm whale that bit off his leg on the ship's previous voyage. A contribution to the literature of the American Renaissance, Moby-Dick was published to mixed reviews, was a commercial failure, and was out of print at the time of the author's death in 1891. Its reputation as a Great American Novel was established only in the 20th century, after the 1919 centennial of its author's birth. William Faulkner said he wished he had written the book himself, and D. H. Lawrence called it "one of the strangest and most wonderful books in the world" and "the greatest book of the sea ever written". Its opening sentence, "Call me Ishmael", is among world literature's most famous.
Ishmael is a character in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851), which opens with the line "Call me Ishmael." He is the first-person narrator of much of the book. Because Ishmael plays a minor role in the plot, early critics of Moby-Dick assumed that Captain Ahab was the protagonist. Many either confused Ishmael with Melville or overlooked the role he played. Later critics distinguished Ishmael from Melville, and some saw his mystic and speculative consciousness as the novel's central force rather than Captain Ahab's monomaniacal force of will.
Queequeg is a character in the 1851 novel Moby-Dick by American author Herman Melville. The story outlines his royal, Polynesian descent, as well as his desire to “visit Christendom” that led him to leave his homeland. Queequeg is visually distinguished by his striking facial tattoos and tan skin. Ishmael encounters Queequeg in Chapter Four and they become unlikely friends. Once aboard the whaling ship the Pequod, Queequeg becomes the harpooner for the mate Starbuck.
Pequod is a fictional 19th-century Nantucket whaling ship that appears in the 1851 novel Moby-Dick by American author Herman Melville. Pequod and her crew, commanded by Captain Ahab, are central to the story, which, after the initial chapters, takes place almost entirely aboard the ship during a three-year whaling expedition in the Atlantic, Indian and South Pacific oceans. Most of the characters in the novel are part of Pequod's crew.
Moby Dick is a 1956 American color film adaptation of Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick. It was directed by John Huston with a screenplay by Huston and Ray Bradbury. The film stars Gregory Peck, Richard Basehart and Leo Genn.
Moby Dick is a musical with a book by Robert Longden, and music and lyrics by Longden and Hereward Kaye, first staged in 1990. The plot follows the anarchic and nubile girls of St. Godley's Academy for Young Ladies who, determined to save the institution from bankruptcy, decide to stage Herman Melville's classic 1851 novel in the school's swimming pool. The musical is a mixture of high camp, music hall-style smut, and wild anachronism overflowing with double entendres; the lead role of headmistress/Captain Ahab is portrayed by a man in drag.
Moby-Dick is an 1851 novel by Herman Melville that describes the voyage of the whaleship Pequod, led by Captain Ahab, who leads his crew on a hunt for the whale Moby Dick. There have been a number of adaptations of Moby-Dick in various media.
Moby Dick is a 1930 American pre-Code film from Warner Bros., directed by Lloyd Bacon, and starring John Barrymore, Joan Bennett and Walter Lang. The film is a sound remake of the 1926 silent movie, The Sea Beast, which also starred Barrymore. It is the first film adaptation of Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby Dick that includes a soundtrack.
Moby-Dick is an American opera in two acts, with music by Jake Heggie and libretto by Gene Scheer, adapted from Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick. The opera received its premiere at Dallas Opera in Dallas, Texas, on 30 April 2010. Heggie dedicated the opera to Stephen Sondheim.
Moby Dick is a 2010 film adaptation of Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick. The film is an Asylum production, and stars Barry Bostwick as Captain Ahab. It also stars Renee O'Connor, Michael B. Teh, and Adam Grimes and is directed by Trey Stokes.
Age of the Dragons is a 2011 fantasy film directed by Ryan Little and starring Danny Glover and Vinnie Jones. A fantasy-themed reimagining of Herman Melville's classic 1851 novel, Moby Dick, it was released in the United Kingdom on March 4, 2011.
Moby Dick is a Canadian-German television miniseries based on Herman Melville's 1851 novel of the same name, produced by Tele München Gruppe, with Gate Film, In association with RTH/ORF. Starring William Hurt as Captain Ahab, it was directed by Mike Barker with a screenplay by Nigel Williams. The cast also includes Ethan Hawke as Starbuck, Charlie Cox as Ishmael, Eddie Marsan as Stubb, Gillian Anderson as Ahab's wife, Elizabeth and Donald Sutherland as Father Mapple.
Moby Dick is a 1998 American television miniseries directed by Franc Roddam, written by Roddam, Anton Diether, and Benedict Fitzgerald, and executive produced by Francis Ford Coppola. It is based on Herman Melville's 1851 novel of the same name. It was filmed in Australia in 1997 and first released in the United States in 1998. The miniseries consisted of two episodes, each running two hours with commercials on March 15 and 16 of 1998 on the USA Network. This is Gregory Peck's final on-screen role.
Captain Ahab is a fictional character and one of the protagonists in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851). He is the monomaniacal captain of the whaling ship Pequod. On a previous voyage, the white whale Moby Dick bit off Ahab's leg, and he now wears a prosthetic leg made out of whalebone. The whaling voyage of the Pequod ends up as a hunt for revenge on the whale, as Ahab forces the crew members to support his fanatical mission. When Moby Dick is finally sighted, Ahab's hatred robs him of all caution, and the whale drags him to his death beneath the sea and sinks the Pequod.
Father Mapple is a fictional character in Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick (1851). A former whaler, he has become a preacher in the New Bedford Whaleman's Chapel. Ishmael, the narrator of the novel, hears Mapple's sermon on the subject of Jonah, who was swallowed by a whale but did not turn against God.
Moby Dick is a fictional white sperm whale and the primary antagonist in Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick. Melville based the whale on an albino whale of that period, Mocha Dick.
Bulkington is a character in Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick. Bulkington is referred to only by his last name and appears only twice, briefly in Chapter 3, "The Spouter Inn", and then in Chapter 23, "The Lee Shore", a short chapter of several hundred words devoted entirely to him.
Pip, short for Pippin, is the African-American cabin-boy on the whaling-ship Pequod in Herman Melville's 1851 novel, Moby-Dick. When Pip falls overboard he is left stranded in the sea, and rescued only by chance and becomes "mad." The book's narrator, Ishmael, however, thinks that this "madness" gives Pip the power to see the world as it is. Pip is first described as "insignificant," but is the only member of the crew to awaken feelings of humanity in Ahab, the ship's monomaniacal captain.
"Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish" is chapter 89 of Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick, in which Ishmael, the book's narrator, explains the concept of "Fast-Fish" and "Loose-Fish." If a whale, whether dead or not, is marked by a ship's crew with anything to claim it, such as a harpoon or rope, it is a "fast-fish", that is, it must be left alone by other whalers; if it is not so marked, it is a "loose-fish", which can be claimed by any ship that finds it. The clarity of this doctrine, Ishmael says, prevents disputes from escalating into violence. He describes court cases dealing with disputes between crews of whaling ships, and then extends the concept to society and politics, questioning the concept of ownership and the right to possession.
Moby Dick was a 1954 American television movie. Adapted from the novel Moby Dick by Herman Melville it aired as an episode of Hallmark Hall of Fame.
It is impossible to say just when or how the political situation seized Melville's attention; but at some point between the Webster-Calhoun exchange in Washington in March 1850 and the outbreak of conflict in Boston at the end of that year, the crisis took effect on his work-in-progress. In his earlier books, he had shunted political matters into tangential comments that read like editorials patched onto the main narrative; but in Moby- Dick, politics became a central element in the larger constellation of themes, as if the incidental realism of Redburn and White-Jacket had been melded with the political allegory of Mardi. The Pequod becomes a replica of the American ship of state; its thirty-man crew ('isolatoes federated along one keel') matched in number the thirty states that constituted the Union in 1850. The Pequod's labor system, made up of white overseers and dark underlings, replicates that of 'the American army and military and merchant navies, and the engineering forces employed in the construction of the American Canals and Railroads.'