Moby dick - my first impression

Prejudiced reader

At last I kept my hands on this novel by Herman Melville written about two centuries ago. The famous book about a whale by the name. There was a great resistance for me to hold the book in my hand for years. I can remember there was a copy somewhere in the shady corners of the house, but I never bothered to pick it up when my eye caught it occationally. Now I know where all the resistance came from. Who wants to read a 500 page book about a man and a whale? What interesting story can come out of such a simple affair. But, I was wrong. And deeply regretted that I did not give it a go a long time ago somewhere in my youth. But, that's life right? With a list of regrets and triumphs, that makes a man swing in between.

I picked up the book. Randomly out of the library shelf. It hasn't been borrowed more than handful of times it had been there dusting in the library, for a decade. I could see it wasn't only me who ill treated this whale story. And with a good reason.

The common prejudice among who haven't read the book, including me a couple weeks ago, was that the book is about a man and a whale. Or whaling. But that is totally wrong. Only two pages of the first chapter made me realise the book is nothing but about whales. It just felt like a dictionary to me. Like a thick tropical jungle of words. A poetic one perhaps.

Moby dick

My first impression on Moby Dick

In such a jungle you cannot move, than a few feet forward in a day. You have to make an effort. You have to make your own path. You have to study the flora, and cut the thicket with your cynthes with all your might as you proceed. You have to use a map. The resting is mandatory and inevitable, as daunting the task is. Yet I have seen explorers travel into these remort parts of the nature to be amazed of the silence and connectivity they feel within these evergreen forests. Similar was the journey through the first few chapters of the book.

Imagine reading a comic. Everything is illustrated in pictures and story is just outlined in few words per frame. You can read such a magazine while you travel in the train or in a busy city park. But Moby dick is different. I couldn't understand anything unless I was fully concentrated on every word like a monk deeply engaged in meditation. Imagine you have been to an art gallary. Fact that you can rush through it in a half an hour doesn't mean you have gained an optimal experience. Sometimes you have to stop and stare at a masterpiece to appriciate the shades, the minute details, and the general abstract patterns. Imagine you have 500 such masterpieces in the same gallery? How will you respond to this? I am sure the only way you can is by sparing some of your quality time of your day to be with each painting. Maybe you will come back to some of the paintings you have appreciated before. And that is the journey I had to take reading the moby dick. Once I am done with the first attempt I will revisit the gallary again and again. Not because I want to learn more, but because the time I spend there is peaceful. Such is my first impression on Moby dick.

Where I am headed - loomings

There is no need to give you 100 reasons to read the book. If you love literature there is no reason you shouldn't, and a shame if you wouldn't. Such is the effect its having on me, as I know now my life would be divided into two parts. Before Moby dick, and after Moby dick. Maybe I am prejudiced by all the scholars. So what. We all are prejudiced by our own mothers. And that is my first impression on the book. I haven't even finished reading it when I write this, and it's hillarious, that I laugh at myself. What If the ending is terrible?