Posts by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
(DIR) Post #9sDcYLyw37sqlXl4sa by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-05T15:09:58Z
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Starbuck (1st mate) is described as a man for whom courage is but a resource. he has no true moral fiber, but he can be brave when mortal danger necessitates. he is a practical whalerStubbs is easy going. completely unconcerned about the dangers of whaling. for him "the jaws of death" are "an easy chair."Flask is a man of "pervading mediocrity" for whom whales and the sea hold no majesty or grandeurand he sets these three officers up over the course of the novel. they are fine men. "momentous" men. and theyre the exact worst people to stand up to ahab. Starbuck has no real bravery to draw from to confront him. stubbs is too easy going to care. and flask doesnt have the intellectual capacity to recognize a bad situation
(DIR) Post #9sDcYOH5WbansQGbS4 by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-05T22:42:26Z
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one song that absolutely does not fit the tone of Moby Dick is "Come Sail Away" by Styx
(DIR) Post #9sDcYOijrni7GBCgYC by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-06T21:16:47Z
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this is...uhh timely? One thing that cannot be overstated is that Moby Dick (mentioned in this article) is maybe the most racist book i've ever read. in a 19th century sense, it treats racism as science. definitionally racist. there are story elements pivotal to the narrative, main characters, major plot points, etc. that do not function without racism. there is nothing anyone could ever do to lessen the racism of this novel. it is an inherent quality of the work. https://www.theroot.com/books-in-blackface-barnes-noble-celebrates-black-his-1841473226
(DIR) Post #9sDcYPgIINLiEt4FNY by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-06T21:19:12Z
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we're talking Heart of Darkness levels of racism. we're talking Rudyard Kipling levels of racism. Moby Dick might be the single best argument i've ever read fro throwing out the entire "cannon," with or without the bathwater
(DIR) Post #9sDcYQh2X5XXNUQMBE by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-09T18:14:12Z
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the saga...continuesmelville has decided that for the time being, everything will be very dramatic (he writes character entrances and exits into the chapters)
(DIR) Post #9sDcYROztehZZozShE by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:32:54Z
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Moby Dick by Herman Melville Livetoot 24/?Whaler's Trick
(DIR) Post #9sDcYRtU4J5X6NFoDQ by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:33:53Z
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Moby Dick by Herman Melville Livetoot 25/?you think Alan Moore read Moby Dick? I bet he fucking did
(DIR) Post #9sDcYSXte3Pl7iA5Cq by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:34:34Z
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tons of action in the last couple of chapters. We had "The First Lowering". Ishmael chases his first whale, and almost dies. this is described as "normal"
(DIR) Post #9sDcYTScFAmhxchNc8 by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:37:03Z
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Additionally, Ahab reveals that he's brought an extra boat's crew onboard. he hid them away from everyone else. Dark magic influences are heavily impliedWe get lots of cool, spooky foreshadowing in "The Albatross". Even the sea birds fly away from Ahab
(DIR) Post #9sDcYUGFGeU2RXv0yG by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:39:29Z
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We then get a very strange framed narrative in "The Town-Ho's Story"Really not sure why this is included except as a comedic distraction. Herman Melville really likes to do this bit where he says,"Okay so now I'm gonna talk about X...actually, youve probably never heard of X before, so here's a long story and/or encyclopedia entry on what X is."And that will be it's own chapter. And then he'll go, "Okay, so now that you understand what X is, I can talk about how X happened on this voyage. And you'll properly understand why the X that took place on *this* voyage was so fucked up compared to normal cases of X"
(DIR) Post #9sDcYVJ7NSNLgkGp5U by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:40:53Z
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"The Town-Ho's" story is maybe the most absurd instance of this so far. It doesn't really tell us a goddamn thing. It's just a story Ishmael swears is true, and is tangentially related to Moby Dick bringing bad luck...or being an agent of Providence or...something...
(DIR) Post #9sDcYW14k1XNt4pvbU by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:41:08Z
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fucking great chapter. 10/10 honestly
(DIR) Post #9sDcYWY2lRuPXKGFzU by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:50:08Z
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Oh wait! I have to go backwards. Chapter 47 - "The Mat-Maker" is so powerful. If there's one passage that sums the novel so far, it's from this. Ishmael is helping Queequeg to weave a sort of mat that will allow him to lash some extra belongings onto the side of the boat
(DIR) Post #9sDcYXCoJsWDZlKoXA by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:51:10Z
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"I say so strange a dreaminess did there then reign all over the ship and all over the sea, only broken by the intermitting dull sound of the sword, that it seemed as if this were the Loom of Time, and I myself were a shuttle mechanically weaving and weaving away at the Fates. There lay the fixed threads of the warp subject to but one single, ever returning, unchanging vibration, and that vibration merely enough to admit of the crosswise interblending of other threads with its own. This warp seemed necessity; and here, thought I, with my own hand I ply my own shuttle and weave my own destiny into these unalterable threads. Meantime, Queequeg's impulsive, indifferent sword, sometimes hitting the woof slantingly, or crookedly, or strongly, or weakly, as the case might be; and by this difference in the concluding blow producing a corresponding contrast in the final aspect of the completed fabric;
(DIR) Post #9sDcYXsHpfhBeOjwBM by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:51:44Z
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"this savage's sword, thought I, which thus finally shapes and fashions both warp and woof; this easy, indifferent sword must be chance- aye, chance, free will, and necessity- wise incompatible- all interweavingly working together. The straight warp of necessity, not to be swerved from its ultimate course- its every alternating vibration, indeed, only tending to that; free will still free to ply her shuttle between given threads; and chance, though restrained in its play within the right lines of necessity, and sideways in its motions directed by free will, though thus prescribed to by both, chance by turns rules either, and has the last featuring blow at events."
(DIR) Post #9sDcYYSnduu1Tdp65w by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:54:46Z
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this passage is the novel. It's a yarn. or rather..it's a whole tapestry. And a million little coincidences shape it. but it's all predestined. It's all moving to one, inexorable doom. Melville strives to write a story like our own lives: winding, circuitous, with many chance diversions and colorful insignificances that nevertheless give it meaning.
(DIR) Post #9sDcYZNAGLzOISC6wy by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-15T17:55:21Z
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or maybe they dont? he doesn't know. there's a dreamlike impossibility of knowing anything. it simply is. and then it's gone
(DIR) Post #9sDcYa5TbbR0VsvV1E by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-20T01:26:10Z
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Past the halfway point!Chapter 61 " Kills a Whale" requires a lot of Melville's typical technical buildup to be understood. but this time, instead of detailing every bit of equipment before the hunt, so as to give it away, Melville give us action followed by retroactive explanation. The whale chase is hunt, heart stopping, and brutal. the murder of the whale can only really be read as tragicthen what follows after is perhaps the most outrageously offensive and racist passage i think i've read so far. drunk from his conquest over the whale, Stubbs awakens a 90 year-old black cook in the middle of the night, forces him to cook a steak for him, and then forces him to talk to the sharks feasting on the whale carcass for amusement
(DIR) Post #9sEAxOWD9TwsJYR1N2 by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-20T11:34:37Z
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@pounce lmao no i am actually reading moby dick
(DIR) Post #9sEejkigoCNTk0gNnM by Absolutely_Blakely@radical.town
2020-02-20T17:08:10Z
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why hasnt anyone opened a Paul McCartney account on is.nota.live ??