Moby Dick Pod

"How could one look at Ahab then, seated on that tripod of bones, without bethinking him of the royalty it symbolized?"

After discovering he no longer enjoys smoking, Ahab throws his pipe overboard.  

"A hot old man! I guess he's got what some folks ashore call a conscience."

Ishmael witnesses an altercation between Captain Ahab and the second mate, Stubb. 

"So powerfully did the whole grim aspect of Ahab affect me, and the livid brand which streaked it, that for the first few moments I hardly noted that not a little of this overbearing grimness was owing to the barbaric white leg upon which he partly stood."

Ishmael lays eyes on Captain Ahab for the first time. 

"They were nearly all Islanders in the Pequod, Isolatoes too, I call such, not acknowledging the common continent of men, but each Isolato living on a separate continent of his own. Yet now, federated along one keel, what a set these Isolatoes were!"

Ishmael describes the other mates aboard the Pequod. Starbuck, Stubb, Flask, Tishtego, & Daggoo. 

"I will have no man in my boat," said Starbuck, "who is not afraid of a whale... an utterly fearless man is a far more dangerous comrade than a coward."

Ishmael describes Starbuck, 1st mate. 

"We whalemen supply your kings and queens with coronation stuff!"

Ishmael forgot to include this chapter in the last. 

"But this is not the half; look again."

Ishmael extolls the virtues of the whaling profession, whalers, and the wonders of far off places. 

On our first weekend wrap up, I'll be talking about our weird, sometimes relatable narrator Ishmael. What do we know about this guy? Who is he? Why is he?

"Wonderfullest things are ever the unmentionable; deep memories yield no epitaphs."

Ishmael is the ship, the ship is Ishmael. 

"I felt a sudden sharp poke in my rear, and turning round, was horrified at the apparition of Captain Peleg in the act of withdrawing his leg from my immediate vicinity." 

Peleg and Bildad wish the crew a farewell like worried parents. And we've finally set sail...!