NCHS AP English Language

Electronic Portfolio (Questions 1-10) - Ellen, Kelly, Anh, Melissa

1) Create a vertical scheme of the Pequod’s hierarchy using the concept of the Great Chain of Being:
Captains/Owners – Ahab, Bildad, Peleg
1st mate - Starbuck
2nd mate - Stubb
3rd mate - Flask
Harpooners – Queequeg, Tashtego, Daggoo
Blacksmith - Perth
Crew – Ishmael, Pippin, Fadallah, Bulkington
Steward - Dough-boy
The cook - Fleece

2) Research and discuss Ahab’s “mark” (cf. the Mark of Cain). Closely read and constellate Ahab’s major qualities.
Ahab’s “mark”
Physical
From a whale
Wants revenge
Divides him in half from “crown to sole” literally from his head to feet, non-literally from the crown on his head, to his soul inside of him
He is not protected by his mark, not condemned, but rather he is set apart
Foreshadowing – because hunting the whale has become his life, it is now his because his revenge has become his downfall.

Cain’s mark
To protect him from anyone trying to kill Cain from his brother, Abel (not physical)
Marks him as a sinner
Paradoxical mystery – even though he sinned greatly, God is still protecting him
Gets exiled

3) Rework your notes and research on the numinous into a coherent argument that demonstrate how Ishmael was touched by the numinous and what the implications of this might be.
Our website for Numinous is http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/gothic/numinous.html

Numinous is something spiritual. In other words, it is anything that is non-secular and holy. It often inspires a sense of awe in the person experiencing it.

Ishmael’s childhood numinous experience and his incident with Queequeg are parallel in their principium individuationis, or the way in which the individual knows things as phenomena. Ishmael himself compares the two experiences though, the former he remembers with “the most awful fears” (29), and the latter he thinks of as a “comical predicament” (29).

When Ishmael was a child, he was climbing up the chimney, like the sweep he had seen do a few days earlier. His stepmother pulled him out by the legs and sent him to bed around two o’clock on June 21st the summer solstice. He eventually fell asleep and when he awoke the light that was there when he had drifted off was replaced by darkness. He felt as if he had a hand placed in his. Though he knows now that there could never have been a hand in his, he still wonders what he felt. Now, he feels an overwhelming sense of deja vu and numinous as he feels the same thing happening except that this time there really was a hand thrown over him. There was an arm over his body, over the counterpane.

4) From Chapter 36, select four difficult passages to research and to explicate. Use the sequence beginning with “Nantucket market! Hoot!” through the end of the chapter. What is Ahab doing in this passage? What is he creating?
Our four passages are:
1) p. 174 - Soon his steady, ivory stride was heard, as to and fro he paced his old rounds, upon planks so familiar to his tread, that they were all over dented, like geological stones, with the peculiar mark of his walk. Did you fixedly gaze, too, upon that ribbed and dented brow; there also, you would see still stranger foot- prints - the foot-prints of his one unsleeping, ever-pacing thought.
2) p. 176 - Receiving the top-maul from Starbuck, he advanced towards the main-mast with the hammer uplifted in one hand, exhibiting the gold with the other, and with a high raised voice exclaiming: Whosoever of ye raises me a white-headed whale with a wrinkled brow and a crooked jaw; whosoever of ye raises me that white-headed whale, with three holes punctured in his starboard fluke - look ye, whosoever of ye raises me that same white whale, he shall have this gold ounce, my boys!
3) p. 178 - "Nantucket market! Hoot! But come closer, Starbuck; thou requirest a little lower layer. If money's to be the measurer, man, and the accountants have computed their great counting-house the globe, by girdling it with guineas, one to every three parts of an inch; then, let me tell thee, that my vengeance will fetch a great premium here!"
4) p. 179 - Receiving the brimming pewter, and turning to the harpooners, he ordered them to produce their weapons. Then ranging them before him near the capstan, with their harpoons in their hands, while his three mates stood at his side with their lances, and the rest of the ship's company formed a circle round the group; he stood for an instant searchingly eyeing every man of his crew. But those wild eyes met his, as the bloodshot eyes of the prairie wolves meet the eye of their leader, ere he rushes on at their head in the trail of the bison; but, alas! only to fall into the hidden snare of the Indian.

What is Ahab doing in these passages?
1) In this passage Ahab is pacing around a spot he has evidently paced around before because there are marks on the floor from his leg.
2) In this passage Ahab is encouraging or bribing the men to get him the white-headed whale.
3) In this passage Ahab bribes the men with a piece of pure Spanish gold and telling them that his vengeance has reached its peak.
4) In this passage Ahab is in a way forming a cult or maybe a religion with the harpooners.

What is Ahab creating?
Captain Ahab is creating or making a 'blood oath' with the harpooners in order to get him the white-headed whale.

5) Chapter 37 “Sunset” – This is a soliloquy. What is the essential statement Ahab makes? Research Ahab’s psychology with regard to monomania.
The essential statement that Ahab makes is “The part to my fixed purpose is laid with iron rails, whereon my soul is grooved to run” (183). Ahab’s psychology is that he must kill Moby Dick because he is obsessed with Moby Dick. He has monomania because he is focused only on Moby Dick and he knows that it has been prophesized that he will be killed because of Moby Dick. Regardless of this fact, his monomania has taken him beyond that where nothing can stand in his way, because he only wants one thing, and that one thing is Moby Dick. He does not care whether or not he hurts someone in the process, he’s so enveloped with trying to get Moby Dick, he does not respond to what happens around him. Monomania is where one is focused on one thing and nothing else and will not let anything else stand in its way. His monomania has taken him far and because of this, it will be his and he does not want to acknowledge that. Ahab refuses to acknowledge the fact that Moby Dick might be his downfall and instead, pursues after Moby Dick until it leads to his death. His mind has been completely enveloped with Moby Dick.

6) Chapter 38, Starbuck’s soliloquy. What is the central trope that Melville employs and why is it appropriate?
"What is the central trope that Melville employs and why is it appropriate" you ask, well I’ll tell you. According to Wikipedia, “In literature, a trope is a familiar and repeated symbol, meme, theme, motif, style, character or thing that permeates a particular type of literature". It goes on to give examples such as a mad scientist, or a dark stormy night, which are used as a basis for many literary works. So too does Moby Dick have many tropes sprinkled throughout its many chapters. Chapter 38 is no exception. One trope that is present is Ahab as a controlling tyrant. In this chapter, Starbuck soliloquizes about how he knows that Ahab will eventually fall and take Starbuck with him, but he also knows that he will help Ahab until the end because he is inextricably bound to him. So too are the subjects of a tyrant bound to him until he falls, though maybe for different reasons.

7) Chapter 42. “The Whiteness of the Whale.” Read. Table talk. Categorize all the allusion by type. (You create the categories.) What do you conclude about the meaning of Moby Dick?
Countries/Places/Time
Lima – cannot ever decay completely, cannot be covered by green and will forever be white. People are always finding new ruins of Lima, and it can never be left in peace. White represents new. (210)
White hoods of Ghent
White tower of London – tell about the ‘imagination of an untraveled American” (209)
White Mountains of New Hampshire and the White Sea are both more terrifying than other places because they are white
Peru – snow covered Andes – Are huge and very white and would be terrifying to get lost in.
Scenery of the Antarctic seas

Cultures/People
Native Americans – the white belt of Wampum which symbolizes deepest honor
The white man is though of as superior to other colored men
Romans – white stone marked a joyful day
Iroquois sacrifice ad White Dog
Christian priests ‘derive the name of one part of their sacred vesture, the alb or tunic” (205)
Albino man – he is ‘loathed by his own kin and kith’ and his whiteness makes him ‘more strangely hideous than the ugliest abortion.’ (207-208)

Animals
Jove incarnated a snow-white bull
Polar bear – the whiteness makes the bear all the scarier
White Shark – because they are white, our horror of them increases
Albatross – ‘unspotted whiteness’ and ‘vast archangel wings’ are used to describe the bird when Ishmael first sees it. It entrances him, and he is drawn to it.
White Steeds of the Prairies – induces fear and respect because of its majesty and color. For both the albatross and the white steed, there is a strange glory in them.
The albino whale itself is a symbol. Whale = Moby Dick

The color itself
Enhances beauty
“royal pre-eminence in this hue”
Innocence of brides
Benignity of age
Majesty of justice
Spotlessness and power
“White forked flame help at the holiest on the alter”
Redemption
Honorable
Sublime
Sweet
Associated with the dead and dying, and also with ghosts.
Ishmael gives an example of a man who is sailing in another and does not feel safe until he is back in blue waters again.
Symbolizes ‘the very veil of Christian Deity’ (212)
But also Atheism
It both a lack of color and a joining of all the colors
Indefiniteness

8) Chapter 48 “The First Lowering” – Go to the paragraph beginning “It was a sight full of quick wonder and awe.” Find five tropes.
The first of the five tropes found in The First Lowering is “the omnipotent sea”. In most literary works that take place at sea, the sea is viewed as dangerous and intimidating, simply because of it vastness and depth. In the Greek culture, the sea is controlled by the god Poseidon. As a gad he is omnipotent, and can make the sea calm and harmless, but also make it into a violent storm. The latter is what the crew of the Pequod is braving in this chapter. In this context, the trope of the omnipotent sea is used to fight against the crew as they search for the white whale.
The second trope is “the knife-like edge”. This trope is used to show the gravity of the situation. Instead of the boat merely riding over the waves, it “tips…on the knife-like edge” (238). As one would imagine, being on the edge of a knife is no pleasant thing. Neither, apparently, is being on the Pequod at this particular point in time.
One of the most common tropes in Moby Dick is the mention of white, or in this case “ivory”. That the Pequod, which is what ivory is referring to, should be related by this term to Moby Dick is very interesting. It would imply that neither is very different from the other. Oh, they’re not exactly the same by any means; perhaps that is why uses ivory instead of white. But the comparison is present and is used to describe the Pequod as it battles the storm.
One other trope found in this chapter is the allusion to a “raw recruit, marching from the bosom of this wife into the heat of his first battle”. This scenario is often in literary works where young men leave the comfort of a home, mother, or wife to go off to war or battle. However scared or worried the young man is about leaving, it is always lost in the heat of the fight or battle. In this chapter, it is said that though this is present, this is not the most exciting part of the ride.
The part that is the most ‘thrilling’ is the chasing of the ‘hunted Sperm Whale’ – which is, incidentally the final trope. This trope actually originates from Moby Dick, and is used in other literary works. The infamous white whale and the chase to hunt it down are often alluded to to represent a futile chase that is destined to failure.

9) Chapter 50, what does Fedallah’s name mean? http://members.cox.net/ramero/melville.htm

The character of Fedallah appears at a glance to be merely a fire worshiping Parsee, and not a vital character. He is often viewed as an evil genius who is in league with Ahab. But quite on the contrary, Fedallah prophesizes about Ahab’s and eventually leads him to it. His prophecy, “hemp only can kill thee” comes true when Ahab is strangled with a hemp rope. In her book, Melville's Orienda, Dorothee Finklestein traces Fedallah’s name back to an Islamic word meaning "ransom of God”. His namesake is later proved when he sacrifices himself to satisfy his deity, and by his sacrifice kills Ahab. Finklestein also notes that hemp is made from, which can be related to the word for “assassin”, which is what Fedallah proves to be.

10) Chapter 51, what is the “Spirit-Spout”? You deduce this based on your reading and research you would care to do.
The Spirit-Spout is the water spout from the blow whole of Moby Dick. It is first noticed by Fedallah while he was on watch at midnight. Fedallah announced that he saw a “silvery, moon-lit jet” (p 253). It is seen once that night and not seen again for a few days. Every time the crew sees the “Spirit-Spout” it disappears before they can turn the Pequod towards it.

Ellen (and) Wagner, Kelly (the) Snyder, Anh (or) Nguyen, Melissa (but) Hamptoon - B Period

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