Feb 27 2010
“How the richer or better is Ahab now?”
“… I struck my first whale- a boy-harpooner of eighteen! Forty-forty-forty years ago! –ago! Forty years of continual whaling! Forty years of privation, and peril, and stormtime! Forty years has Ahab forsaken the peaceful land, for forty years to make war on the horrors of the deep! Aye and yes, Starbuck, out of those forty years I have not spent three ashore.” (519)
This touching monologue by Ahab presents several questions. Should “work” just be a job or lifetime passion? And how much should one sacrifice for that passion and work? Is there a point when work devours the individual and leaves nothing behind? Obviously Ahab is reflecting upon his life and asks himself if his time at sea has been worth all of the sacrifices or if it has been a waste. He states, “…bitter, biting mockery of grey hairs…” (519) It is as though, until this point, he watched his life sail by without taking notice of all the things he forsook for the sea and now feels depressed about everything that could have been if he had been a little more aware. He has given up hope, on life, on this voyage. Virtually he sacrificed his youth, his family, his peaceful and his leg for the sea. He begs to ask himself, “How the richer or better is Ahab now?” (519) Now at the end of his days, was it all worth it?
Perhaps part of the monologue is for the benefit of Starbuck, who is the only one witnessing Ahab’s emotional break down. Ahab must see Starbuck as a younger, less crazed, version of himself. Starbuck has a wife and a child. Ahab is thus demonstrating what could possibly happen to Starbuck if he forsook his family for the sea. It is a warning of a life lost, a life spent wandering the sea in search of meaning that very well could be found on land.
But even though Ahab recognizes all the failures of his life (his virtually widowed wife and fatherless child), he is unwilling to give up on the search for the white whale. Starbuck offers him the opportunity to head home, to see his family, to experience a peaceful life ashore. If Ahab abandons the search for Moby Dick now, it possibly be seen as yet another failure in his life. He must finish and accomplish this one goal. But I believe that Ahab acknowledges that the voyage and the whale may be his end. Thus is his passion for the sea, his passion for whaling, were they worth everything that he gave up? Or is part of Ahab’s madness due to the fact that his life is so singular, so focused on the hunt for whales?
4 Responses to ““How the richer or better is Ahab now?””
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I like where you went with this post. Delving into the origins of Ahab’s obsession is a tall task and you did it quite well in a few paragraphs. I think one possible aspect of his madness that should have been addressed is intoxication with power. As we have discussed at length in class, a whaling ship was a kingdom unto itself–and the Captain the supreme ruler. A man above the law for “forty years” is certainly at risk of becoming power-crazed by virtue of his position alone. Ruler of the ship–with a little psychosis mixed in–can quickly become ruler of the sea. At least in Ahab’s head.
I think that power certainly has had its effect on ravaging Ahab, although I’m not sure we get much of a sense of his whaling career before Moby Dick. He seems to be described as being relatively normal (as far as whaling captains go), and then the loss of his leg and his confrontation with the white whale ignited some lurking psychosis. If he had been like this on other voyages there is no way he would still be a captain, or able to find a crew. This is the first time where others lose confidence in him, but more importantly, the first time he loses confidence in himself. The “critical third day” shows the final descent of a man who, mired in insanity and completely exhausted, seems destined to lose his life to the whale. While we can ascertain that this is probably the way the book ends, we do not truly know it until we see Ahab giving up. “Some men die at ebb tide; some at low water; some at the full of the flood;-and I feel now like a billow that’s all one crested comb, Starbuck. I am old” (501). Ahab again compares life and death to water in this moment of crazed clarity. He believes that there is no reason for him to live except Moby Dick, and once he knows his obsession won’t let him live, we know exactly how the book ends.
If Ahab was an economics major, do you think he would have accepted his hunt for Moby Dick as a sunk cost and gone home? He seems to keep saying “It’s too late for me!” and talks about what he must do now that he’s come this far, but as we know, it’s a sunk cost!
After all, he’s on a boat. He can turn around whenever he wants. Is it not irrational for him to continue hunting when he clearly would rather be at home with his not-quite-widowed wife? This is a rhetorical question of course, but one I thought you’d find amusing anyway.
More seriously, when I re-read the pages you quote above, I focused on the part about food. Especially the line “I have fed upon dry salted fare— fit emblem of the dry nourishment of my soil!” because the word “soul” can be so easily substituted for soil, both phonetically and substantially. It is almost as if Ahab is adding some flair to the old cliche “water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink.” That is, spending one’s life on the salty, unforgiving ocean leaves one’s soul barren and dry. In contrast, landlubbers’ souls are enriched over the years due to their proximity to the beautiful verdure and plentiful bounty nature provides on shore. In the end, I ended up with the deepest sympathy for Ahab after this speech, and think anyone with fears about the purpose or direction of their own life would as well.
Jaeisenberg,
I like how you employ an economical lens about the text. Similarly thinking about Ahab’s existence and life course, what was the opportunity cost for him having deciding to devote his life to whaling and now specifically seeking revenge against one whale itself? Melville presents an interesting dilemma. Although we do not know necessarily how else Ahab could have spent the majority of his life, or how he would have liked to, we now that he spent it whaling and craving revenge. But, we should ask, what’s the cost of devoting oneself to revenge? After all, if Ahab, after losing his leg, spent the rest of his life on land, doing something he truly enjoyed, he would never have to worry about confronting Moby Dick again. In the end, we know now, Ahab lost not just his leg and not just 40 years of his life, but his actual life to the sea. Given this, he probably should have reasonably given up after his first encounter with Moby Dick and not worried about the whale who would eventually completely defeat him.