Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Moby Dick is the only book we have at our place with both an English and Chinese edition. My wife is starting to have her own book collection and she loves books with great covers. Moby Dick was one of the books she recommended to me that she felt I would enjoy. Seeing it as a book on whaling, it piqued my interest as this is the first book I’ve read on this theme.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville is known as one of the masterpieces of both American and world literature. When Moby Dick was initially published, it did not receive good reviews and was a commercial failure. It was only after Herman Melville’s passing that the novel was rediscovered and viewed as one of the great literature works of his time.

Moby Dick centered around the maniacal quest of Ahab, the captain of the Pequod whaling ship, to pursue and defeat Moby Dick, the giant white sperm whale who has bitten off Ahab’s leg in his previous whaling voyage. The novel was narrated from Ishmael’s perspective, who is one of the crew members of Pequod.

Herman Melville did a masterful job in narrating the process of a whaling voyage. He immersed readers into the whaling process and at the same time uses his words beautifully in demonstrating the different terminology and concepts that are second nature to a whaling ship crew member. It discusses how a whaling crew is formed, the roles and responsibilities of each member, the different body parts of a whale and what is more sought after, the different compartments of a whaling ship, and the grueling process of whale hunting.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville ranks among the top of my recommendation list. There’s a lot of terminologies that I’m not familiar with when it comes to whaling, but Herman did a wonderful job in educating the readers every step of the way. In a sense, you aren’t just brought along to experience the journey but also onboarded as a crew member to learn the inner workings of a whaling voyage. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Moby Dick and this is one of the few books which I might reread some years later.