РефератыИностранный языкMoMoby Dick By Herman Melville Essay Research 2

Moby Dick By Herman Melville Essay Research 2

?Moby Dick? By Herman Melville Essay, Research Paper


Moby Dick


In the novel ?Moby Dick? by Herman Melville, the apparent themes:


good vs. evil, civilized vs. uncivilized, and conventional vs. unconventional


are throughout the book, but they are not as superficial as they seem.


In treating the theme good vs. evil, the apparent message is one of


Ahab being the innocent victim. A man disfigured and tormented by a beast


of nature. In juxtaposition to that the whale can be perceived as being evil


because of what he did to man. However, if we are to look at this


objectively we would have to admit that man is also a creature of nature,


and therefore you would have to ask, what represents evil in the novel;


Moby Dick or Ahab? Throughout the book Ahab defies God. He speaks


out against him and admits his lack of faith. Moreover, since Ahab is so


obsessed with killing the whale he puts his entire crew in jeopardy which


does not only go against mans law (a captain must never put his crew or


ship in danger for his own selfish intentions), but also goes against God?s


law (mans indifference towards other men is sinful in God?s eyes).


Through these actions we are shown that Ahab is more representative of


the evil side of nature then Moby Dick.


The book also incorporates the theme civilized vs. uncivilized.


Ishmael; the civilized man is compelled to teach Queequeg; the uncivilized


man. Since Ishmael is the Christian and Queequeg the savage, Ishmael


believes that by teaching Queequeg about organized religion, and the


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workings of society, he is saving him by helping him to adapt to the ways


of civilization. Melville has us believe that Queequeg is born into


civilization. That is Melville?s apparent message, but in all actuality it is


Queequeg who allows Ishmael to be born again. Queequeg sees the world


unobscured by the dogmatism of Christianity, which allows Ishmael to


look at the world for what it is, not what religion tells you it is. It is


Queequegs coffin that saves Ishmaels life, it gives him a second chance and


Ishmael is resurrected. The Christian is saved by a coffin handcrafted by a


savage, the coffin is Ishmaels ark.


By simply looking at Melville?s style of writing we can see that the


conventional vs. the unconventional. Melville?s breaking of literary


convention in his writing, foreshadows his underlying depiction of the


religious and social beliefs of the time. These depictions are not what


society wants to read about, and that is why Melville?s book breaks


literary convention in both a literal way and in a figurative way.


By looking deeper into the ambiguities of Melville?s writing, we are


able to understand the ambiguities of life. Under the guise of a seemingly


straight forward adventure novel, Melville subtly suggests greater


meanings to the questions of life, then any one civilization can offer. In


order for his book not to have seemed blasphemous at the time it was


written, Melville had to veil his unconventional opinions under the guise


of convention. ?I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as a lamb.?

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