"Thou art too damned jolly. Sail on." Herman Melville in Moby Dick
Current book-selection rotation: B, M, J, A, K
Saturday, September 27, 2008
Moby Dick - Quotations
Okay, so my new favorite quote is found on the first page of Chapter XVII, "...Heaven have mercy on us all- Presbyterians and Pagans alike- for we are all somehow dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly neeed mending."
"Hark! the infernal orgies!" (Chapter XXXVIII) Here are some of my faves so far.
From the third page of Chapter XXXVI The Quarterdeck: "'...Aye, aye,' he shouted with a terrific, loud, animal sob, like that of a heart-stricken moose.."
From the first page of Chapter XIX The Prophet: "A soul's a sort of fifth wheel to a wagon."
From the first page of Chapter XLIX The Hyena: "He bolts down ... all hard things visible and invisible, never mind how knobby; as an ostrich of potent digestion gobbles down bullets and gun flints."
From the last page of Chapter XXXIX First Night Watch: "Aye, aye, sir -- (Aside) he's my superior, he has his too, if I'm not mistaken."
One that I don't care for at all but that must be mentioned for the sake of pure intellectual discussion about the book, from the second page from Chapter XLII The Whiteness of the Whale: "Though in many natural obejcts, whiteness refingingly enhances beauty, as if imparting some special viritue of it's own ... and though this pre-eminence in it applies to the human race itself, giving the white man ideal mastership over every dusky tribe ... there yet lurks an elusive something in the innermost idea of this hue, which strikes more of panic in the soul than that redness which affrights in blood."
Hmmm, I see why the reference to a heart-stricken moose made it into the top quotes! :0)
The Chapter XLIX quote about the soul is in my picks of favorite quotes as well. I would also like to add:
The last line of Chapter XXIV: "...for a whale-ship was my Yale College and Harvard.
From the middle of Chapter XVI: "I dost," said I unconsciously, he was so intense a Quaker.
As for your quote for discussion... Melville was writing before the Civil War when this was a rather commonly held assumption. Can we hold it against him? On the other hand, he seems conflicted. Frequently he writes of "pagans" and dark-skinned ship-mates with what seems to be admiration and respect. How can we make that consistent with this quote?
Ah, this is why I love great, well-written literature. The grand challenge is to distinguish between what the characters say about other characters, and what the author says about them in the action he depicts.
Granted that the speech between the characters will reflect the broad social beliefs of the day; we frequently see the captain and others refer to the pagans and canibals. However, I think Melville's intent in the book is to show them as the opposite. I don't think I've yet seen an action from Queequeg that isn't noble or valiant (and described in detail). Can we thus infer that Melville held Queequeg in high regard even though others of his characters did not? I'd like to think so, but the comment in chapter 42 makes me wonder.. However, taken in the context of the entire chapter, which goes on to point out how "icky" white things are - maybe he was giving an even subtler message that white men, though dominating the world, are inherently a little icky themselves?
What a good paper this would be. I'm tempted to write one just for shits and giggles.
Only crazy, insane, overly cranial persons write papers for shits and giggles. Let me know when you are done and we'll compare. :-) Just kidding.
Two more quotes, both from Chapter XXIX. Ahab to Stubb: "Then be called ten times a donkey, and a mule, and an ass, and begone, or I'll clear the world of thee." While this quote is just great in itself, it makes me wonder- ten times a donkey, ten times a mule, and ten times an ass OR ten times a donkey, one time a mule, and one time an ass?
And finally, I think my new mantra, from Stubb's thoughts to himself: "Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth..."
"... but it is only when caught in the swift, sudden turn of death, that mortals realize the silent, subtle, ever-present perils of life. And if you be a philospher, though seated in the whaleboat, you would not at heart feel one whit more of terror, than though seated before your evening fire with a poker, and not a harpoon, by your side."
"Yet habit - stange thing! what cannot habit accomplish?"
"... there is no folly of beasts of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men."
"The milk is very sweet and rich; it has been tasted by men; it might do well with strawberries." [from a footnote, in reference to hunting a whale who is nursing a calf]
From chapter LXXXIX, Fast Fish and Loose Fish: "I. A Fast Fish belongs to the party fast to it. II. A Loose Fish is fair game for anybody who can soonest catch it."
"And what are you, reader, but a Loose Fish, and a Fast Fish, too?" [that's me - fast and loose!]
Hmm, I'm not sure that's what he meant by fast and loose...
From Chapter XLIV "The Chart" "...by exhausting and intolerably vivid dreams of the night, which, resuming his own intense thoughts through the day, carried them on amid a clashing of phrensies, and whirled them round and round in his blazing brain..."
It sounds as though he could be working on a dissertation. I find at this point it is good to smash your head against a really hard wall until the throbbing overcomes the clashing of phrensies... :-)
Two more gems have been discovered! Chapter LI "The Spirit Spout" second to last page: "... as if its vast tides were a conscience; and the great mundane soul were in anguish and remorse for the long sin and suffering it had bred." It gave me little chills!
Chapter LIII "The Gam": "Because, in the case of pirates, say, I should like to know wheter that profession of theirs has any peculiar glory about it. It sometimes ends in uncommon elevation, indeed; but only at the gallows. And besides, when a man is elevated to that odd fashion, he has no proper foundation for his superior altitude." It was so subtly funny that I almost missed it! It makes me think of the scene in Pirates of the Caribbean (not sure which one) when Jack Sparrow is hung, but Will throws his sword directly beneath Jack's feel and Jack attempts to balance on an itty-bitty sword blad so he doesn't die. "no proper foundation". :-)
From Chapter XC, Heads or Tails: "And thus there seems a reason in all things, even in law."
From Chapter LXVI, The Shark Massacre: "Queequeg no care what god made him shark," said the savage, agonizingly lifting his hand up and down; "wedder Fejee god or Nantucket god; but de god wat made shark must be one dam Ingin."
From Chapter XCIII, The Castaway: "... though man loved his fellow, yet man is a moneymaking animal..."
From Chapter XCIV, A Squeeze of the Hand: "Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers' hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually sqeezing their hands, and looking into their eyes sentimentally; as much to say -- Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acertities, or know the slightest ill humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness." [forget the chapter about being strange bedfellows - do you see a homosexual undertone here?]
FANTASTIC!! I want to make a banner of the "reason in law" quote and post it on the door of a couple of legal scholars in the department.
And the "squeeze" quote! Yes, out of context it definitely rings of homosexual undertones. I haven't reached that chapter yet, but now am anxious to get there to see how Melville manages to "squeeze" this into the chapter.
Again, fantastic quotes. You win this round of "quote-finding" for sure.
From Chapter CVII, The Carpenter: "He was a pure manipulator; his brain, if he ever had one, must have early oozed along into the muscles of his fingers."
From Chapter CVIII, Ahab and the Carpenter: [Ahab speaking] "..I like a good grip; I like to feel something in this slippery world that can hold, man."
From Chapter CXI, the Pacific: "..with one nostril he unthinkingly snuffed the sugary musk from the Banshee isles (in whose sweet woods mild lovers must be walking), and with the other consciously inhaled the salt breath of the newfound sea; that sea in which the hated White Whale must even then be swimming." I LOVE the imagery of this line. That the lovers walking in the woods would increase its sweet aroma is just such a lovely thought..
From chapter CXII, The Blacksmith: "Oh, Death, why can'st thou not sometimes be timely?"
From chapter CXV, The Pequod Meets the Bachelor: [Ahab speaking to another catain] "Thou art too damned jolly. Sail on."
From chapter CXXVII, The Deck: [Ahab speaking to Pip] "Back, lad; I will be with ye again presently. He goes! Not this hand complies with my humor more genially than that boy." The Ahab/Pip relationships assumes a very...odd...dynamic toward the end of the book.
From midway through "The Grand Armada"- "Ahab's brow was left gaunt and ribbed, like the black sand beach after some stormy tide has been gnawing at it.." Again, the imagery is great.
And, it would appear that this also concludes our comments on quotations from Moby Dick. One of Melville's strong points is the imagery he conveys with his wording. For all we complain about the excess of chapters on seemingly irrelevent topics, you have to admit that we discovered some great quotes in the book.
I agree, he's a wonderful writer, great imagery, wonderful dry humor and for a time when the average person couldn't conjure up 490752 pictures of whales on google images, I'm sure all the excessive whale-ness was warranted. Perhaps he could do with some editing, a la our separate post.
15 comments:
"Hark! the infernal orgies!" (Chapter XXXVIII) Here are some of my faves so far.
From the third page of Chapter XXXVI The Quarterdeck:
"'...Aye, aye,' he shouted with a terrific, loud, animal sob, like that of a heart-stricken moose.."
From the first page of Chapter XIX The Prophet:
"A soul's a sort of fifth wheel to a wagon."
From the first page of Chapter XLIX The Hyena:
"He bolts down ... all hard things visible and invisible, never mind how knobby; as an ostrich of potent digestion gobbles down bullets and gun flints."
From the last page of Chapter XXXIX First Night Watch:
"Aye, aye, sir -- (Aside) he's my superior, he has his too, if I'm not mistaken."
One that I don't care for at all but that must be mentioned for the sake of pure intellectual discussion about the book, from the second page from Chapter XLII The Whiteness of the Whale:
"Though in many natural obejcts, whiteness refingingly enhances beauty, as if imparting some special viritue of it's own ... and though this pre-eminence in it applies to the human race itself, giving the white man ideal mastership over every dusky tribe ... there yet lurks an elusive something in the innermost idea of this hue, which strikes more of panic in the soul than that redness which affrights in blood."
Hmmm, I see why the reference to a heart-stricken moose made it into the top quotes! :0)
The Chapter XLIX quote about the soul is in my picks of favorite quotes as well. I would also like to add:
The last line of Chapter XXIV: "...for a whale-ship was my Yale College and Harvard.
From the middle of Chapter XVI: "I dost," said I unconsciously, he was so intense a Quaker.
As for your quote for discussion... Melville was writing before the Civil War when this was a rather commonly held assumption. Can we hold it against him? On the other hand, he seems conflicted. Frequently he writes of "pagans" and dark-skinned ship-mates with what seems to be admiration and respect. How can we make that consistent with this quote?
Ah, this is why I love great, well-written literature. The grand challenge is to distinguish between what the characters say about other characters, and what the author says about them in the action he depicts.
Granted that the speech between the characters will reflect the broad social beliefs of the day; we frequently see the captain and others refer to the pagans and canibals. However, I think Melville's intent in the book is to show them as the opposite. I don't think I've yet seen an action from Queequeg that isn't noble or valiant (and described in detail). Can we thus infer that Melville held Queequeg in high regard even though others of his characters did not? I'd like to think so, but the comment in chapter 42 makes me wonder.. However, taken in the context of the entire chapter, which goes on to point out how "icky" white things are - maybe he was giving an even subtler message that white men, though dominating the world, are inherently a little icky themselves?
What a good paper this would be. I'm tempted to write one just for shits and giggles.
Only crazy, insane, overly cranial persons write papers for shits and giggles. Let me know when you are done and we'll compare. :-) Just kidding.
Two more quotes, both from Chapter XXIX. Ahab to Stubb: "Then be called ten times a donkey, and a mule, and an ass, and begone, or I'll clear the world of thee." While this quote is just great in itself, it makes me wonder- ten times a donkey, ten times a mule, and ten times an ass OR ten times a donkey, one time a mule, and one time an ass?
And finally, I think my new mantra, from Stubb's thoughts to himself: "Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth..."
The 11th and 12th com. quote is fantastic!
Both from Chapter LX, The Line
"... but it is only when caught in the swift, sudden turn of death, that mortals realize the silent, subtle, ever-present perils of life. And if you be a philospher, though seated in the whaleboat, you would not at heart feel one whit more of terror, than though seated before your evening fire with a poker, and not a harpoon, by your side."
"Yet habit - stange thing! what cannot habit accomplish?"
From chapter LXXXVII, The Armada:
"... there is no folly of beasts of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men."
"The milk is very sweet and rich; it has been tasted by men; it might do well with strawberries." [from a footnote, in reference to hunting a whale who is nursing a calf]
From chapter LXXXIX, Fast Fish and Loose Fish:
"I. A Fast Fish belongs to the party fast to it.
II. A Loose Fish is fair game for anybody who can soonest catch it."
"And what are you, reader, but a Loose Fish, and a Fast Fish, too?" [that's me - fast and loose!]
Hmm, I'm not sure that's what he meant by fast and loose...
From Chapter XLIV "The Chart"
"...by exhausting and intolerably vivid dreams of the night, which, resuming his own intense thoughts through the day, carried them on amid a clashing of phrensies, and whirled them round and round in his blazing brain..."
It sounds as though he could be working on a dissertation. I find at this point it is good to smash your head against a really hard wall until the throbbing overcomes the clashing of phrensies... :-)
Two more gems have been discovered!
Chapter LI "The Spirit Spout" second to last page: "... as if its vast tides were a conscience; and the great mundane soul were in anguish and remorse for the long sin and suffering it had bred." It gave me little chills!
Chapter LIII "The Gam": "Because, in the case of pirates, say, I should like to know wheter that profession of theirs has any peculiar glory about it. It sometimes ends in uncommon elevation, indeed; but only at the gallows. And besides, when a man is elevated to that odd fashion, he has no proper foundation for his superior altitude." It was so subtly funny that I almost missed it! It makes me think of the scene in Pirates of the Caribbean (not sure which one) when Jack Sparrow is hung, but Will throws his sword directly beneath Jack's feel and Jack attempts to balance on an itty-bitty sword blad so he doesn't die. "no proper foundation". :-)
From Chapter XC, Heads or Tails:
"And thus there seems a reason in all things, even in law."
From Chapter LXVI, The Shark Massacre:
"Queequeg no care what god made him shark," said the savage, agonizingly lifting his hand up and down; "wedder Fejee god or Nantucket god; but de god wat made shark must be one dam Ingin."
From Chapter XCIII, The Castaway:
"... though man loved his fellow, yet man is a moneymaking animal..."
From Chapter XCIV, A Squeeze of the Hand:
"Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers' hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually sqeezing their hands, and looking into their eyes sentimentally; as much to say -- Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acertities, or know the slightest ill humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness." [forget the chapter about being strange bedfellows - do you see a homosexual undertone here?]
"Toes are scarce among veteran blubber-room men."
FANTASTIC!! I want to make a banner of the "reason in law" quote and post it on the door of a couple of legal scholars in the department.
And the "squeeze" quote! Yes, out of context it definitely rings of homosexual undertones. I haven't reached that chapter yet, but now am anxious to get there to see how Melville manages to "squeeze" this into the chapter.
Again, fantastic quotes. You win this round of "quote-finding" for sure.
From Chapter CVII, The Carpenter:
"He was a pure manipulator; his brain, if he ever had one, must have early oozed along into the muscles of his fingers."
From Chapter CVIII, Ahab and the Carpenter:
[Ahab speaking] "..I like a good grip; I like to feel something in this slippery world that can hold, man."
From Chapter CXI, the Pacific:
"..with one nostril he unthinkingly snuffed the sugary musk from the Banshee isles (in whose sweet woods mild lovers must be walking), and with the other consciously inhaled the salt breath of the newfound sea; that sea in which the hated White Whale must even then be swimming."
I LOVE the imagery of this line. That the lovers walking in the woods would increase its sweet aroma is just such a lovely thought..
From chapter CXII, The Blacksmith:
"Oh, Death, why can'st thou not sometimes be timely?"
From chapter CXV, The Pequod Meets the Bachelor:
[Ahab speaking to another catain] "Thou art too damned jolly. Sail on."
From chapter CXXVII, The Deck:
[Ahab speaking to Pip] "Back, lad; I will be with ye again presently. He goes! Not this hand complies with my humor more genially than that boy."
The Ahab/Pip relationships assumes a very...odd...dynamic toward the end of the book.
From midway through "The Grand Armada"- "Ahab's brow was left gaunt and ribbed, like the black sand beach after some stormy tide has been gnawing at it.." Again, the imagery is great.
And, it would appear that this also concludes our comments on quotations from Moby Dick. One of Melville's strong points is the imagery he conveys with his wording. For all we complain about the excess of chapters on seemingly irrelevent topics, you have to admit that we discovered some great quotes in the book.
I agree, he's a wonderful writer, great imagery, wonderful dry humor and for a time when the average person couldn't conjure up 490752 pictures of whales on google images, I'm sure all the excessive whale-ness was warranted. Perhaps he could do with some editing, a la our separate post.
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