Ahab\u2019s maniacal obsessive mind finally takes full control in the chapter The Quadrant.\u00a0 This instrument is used to measure the position of the sun in order to determine a ship\u2019s latitude.\u00a0 Ahab decides that it is useless on his quest to find Moby Dick, exclaiming<\/p>\n
Foolish toy! Babies\u2019 plaything of haughty admirals, and commodores, and captains\u2026Science! Curse thee thou vain toy; and cursed be all the things that casts man\u2019s eyes aloft to that heaven\u2026Curse thee thou quadrant!\u00a0 No longer will I guide my earthly way by thee\u2026thus I split and destroy thee!\u201d (481)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Ahab proceeds to crush the quadrant by stepping on it with both his foot and peg-leg.\u00a0 This dramatic display of the destruction of this tool signifies the disintegration of Ahab\u2019s sanity and the loss a sense of reality.\u00a0 By ruining the Pequod\u2019s navigation instrument, Ahab is left in complete control of the ship\u2019s course and direction.\u00a0 No sound, stable tool can help guide the ship in a reasonable manner.\u00a0 The sailors are left to depend on the fallible mind of their captain, an almost definite sign that the ship will be wrecked and end in doom.\u00a0 By crushing the very tool that can provide a practical mapping for the Pequod to follow a logical course, Ahab exerts himself and his authority over science and in a broader sense, destiny and the larger external forces that affect human lives.\u00a0 Again, this bold gesture serves as an omen that hints of Ahab\u2019s destruction by a man-made object (the harpoon line) that has yet to occur.\u00a0 It also implies the Pequod\u2019s downfall, as all the sailors can do is to follow their insane Captain on his brazen quest to seek revenge upon an angry whale.\u00a0 Breaking the quadrant in a way removes any hope the men, especially Starbuck, might have of ending their journey and finding their way safely back home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ahab\u2019s maniacal obsessive mind finally takes full control in the chapter The Quadrant.\u00a0 This instrument is used to measure the position of the sun in order to determine a ship\u2019s latitude.\u00a0 Ahab decides that it is useless on his quest to find Moby Dick, exclaiming Foolish toy! Babies\u2019 plaything of haughty admirals, and commodores, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,80],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1327","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-character","category-science-or-cetology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1327"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1329,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1327\/revisions\/1329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.vassar.edu\/engl177\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}