Feb 05 2010
The Humanity of the Whale
When looking for character development, most readers would skip over the cetology chapter. However, Melville inserts a remarkable amount of personality into his description of the whales. This is not surprising, considering that, in many ways, Moby Dick is the central character of the novel. In the Cetology chapter, Ishmael refers to every whale as “he,” not “it,” an important, humanizing distinction. Some descriptions are more clearly human-esque than others, such as when Ishmael refers to the Sulphur Bottom whale as a
retiring gentleman, with a brimstone belly, doubtless got by scraping along the Tartarian tiles in some of his profounder divings. He is seldom seen…and then alays at too great a distance to study his countenance. He is never chased; he would run away with the rope-walks of lline. Prodigies are told of him. Adieu, Sulphur Bottom! I can say nothing more that is true of ye (p. 133)
This description sounds eerily applicable to a human, especially the phrase “retiring gentleman” and the words “profounder” and “countenance.” Ishmael is describing a shy man, who runs away from those who pursue him. Few have seen his face, and they know little about him. Without the mention of diving, this could easily be a reclusive guest at an inn or some mystical stowaway on the Pequod.
The characterization of whales seems to be a matter of some debate with the characters in the text. When describing Moby Dick’s encounter with Ahab, and the taking of Ahab’s leg, Ishmael states that “no turbaned Turk, no hired Venetian or Malay, could have smote him with more seeming malice,” (p. 177). This creature is vindictive, which gives him power of thought like a human. The very fact that he has a name, Moby Dick, shows that the line between animal and human is blurred in this narrative. Of course, not everyone sees it this way. When Ahab informs the crew of the goal of this journey, Starbuck protests.
‘Vengeance on a dumb brute!’ cried Starbuck ‘that simply smote thee from blindest instinct! Madness! To be enraged with a dumb thing, Captain Ahab, seems blasphemous!’
Starbuck does not approve of anthropomorphism. To him, blurring the line between human and “dumb brute” is unacceptable, blasphemous. The repeated descriptions of whales as having human characteristics, and the strength of Starbuck’s objections, suggests that this debate will carry on throughout the novel.
(New York: Signet Classic, 1998)
One Response to “The Humanity of the Whale”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
I really like that you treated the whales as characters because, as you said, Melville seems to give all the whales, not just Moby Dick, personalities. To take that line of thought one step further, it seems to me that Ishmael seems to interact better with anyone who is not part of white society. This starts with Queequeg in the Spouter Inn, and then continues with the whale descriptions. Ishmael, although he describes Starbuck, Stubb, and Flask in great detail, hasn’t taken pains to write about direct interactions with them (yet?). Then Ishmael takes many many chapters to write about whales in seemingly loving detail. And one of the happiest moments so far for me was during the chapter “The Grand Armada” when Starbuck’s boat is in the middle of all of the cows and calves. The descriptions make the whales seem to be human mothers and children. From these depictions, it seems to me that Ishmael understands whales better than he can people. This sets Ishmael up to be a sort of a translator between his audience and anyone who doesn’t fit its mould, showing his readers that without too much trouble they can understand (and perhaps reach out to) people different than they are. Perhaps one of the reasons that Melville uses whales as examples of foreigners is that they do not have the baggage attached to them that Africans, Middle Easterners, or other darker-skinned people would have for a white audience. Then readers would be more likely to accept Melville’s message because they wouldn’t be faced with someone they had been conditioned to fear. I agree with your suggestion that the debate will continue — I think it does every time Melville humanizes a stranger and every time he makes a racist comment.