Captain Ahab Symbolism

Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick illustrates a journey across seas in pursuit of discovery, freedom, and vengeance. From the beginning, an aura of mystery surrounds Captain Ahab, as Melville waits to introduce him until well into the novel. The obscurity surrounding Ahab causes an uneasiness amongst the crew that continues throughout the novel. After the attack that left him missing a leg, Ahab views Moby-Dick as evil personified; to Ahab, killing the whale means killing all evil. Ahab’s thirst for blood turns him into a cold-hearted man whose sole purpose is to crucify the white whale.

He shows his strong feelings for his mission by repeating the word “death” in the sentence. The repetition of the word “death” is significant to Ahab’s expression of his passionate tone because it is a word charged with many negative emotions. Emotions like hate and vengeance find their way into the word death, and by repeating it with the intent to kill Moby Dick, it shows Ahab’s twisted passion for the mission. In addition, he adds “God hunt us all”, to show how invested he is in his mission. His emotional ties to the white whale is so strong that he thinks they deserve to be punished if the mission is a

Captain Ahab always had the desire to go after Moby Dick. His obsession grew even deeper when the great white whale took his leg. He spent several years trying to go after the whale. By being the captain of the ship, he had crew members come along on his journey to help slay the whale. His passion grew deeper each day as he lived amongst the ship and set sails to complete his mission.

In the book Moby Dick, there were numerous themes, symbols, motifs but the main one that was the basis of the book was revenge. The book is about Ishmael, the narrator, who goes whaling in a ship called the Pequod, with people that have a significance in the story especially the captain, Ahab. Ahab has an obsession with catching a white whale named Moby Dick that took his leg and this obsession of getting revenge takes a turn for the worst and the everyone on the Pequod, except Ishmael, died. One question we might what to ask ourselves is, what is Captain Ahab taking revenge for? Is it for his leg, For his anger, For his suffering or is it for something totally different? Maybe it's for all of them. Whatever it may be, sometimes the torment is so incredible, and the requirement for retribution becomes so strong, that it festers inside and starts to devour us. Captain Ahab exemplifies the idea of a determined desire for vengeance and shows how it can decimate a man.

Herman Melville, in his epic novel Moby-Dick, utilizes the symbolism of the color of the Great White Whale to demonstrate his theme of duality. However, Captain Ahab tragically had a single mind set towards Moby Dick, as he believed that the whale was the symbol of the world's evil and had to be destroyed. On the other hand, Ishmael sees that the color white can mean many various and opposing things. It would be dangerous to settle upon any one single meaning. In the chapter, The Whiteness of the Whale, Melville explains the importance of duality of meaning in the world, as opposed to man's (and Ahab's) desire to see only one meaning in any one thing. Melville utilizes the symbol of the

Captain Ahab is obsessed with the idea of seeking revenge and killing the great white whale, Moby Dick. He boards the Pequod, a whaleboat ship and with only one mission in mind, to destruct Moby Dick. Ahab is a bad captain for the whaleboat because he is infiltrated with the obsession to kill Moby Dick which makes him manipulative, selfish, and quite dangerous. Even if the Pequod’s fate was to fail or succeed, Ahab made it inevitable to have a good success. Throughout the book, it can be argued that Ahab seems to portray not only the pequod’s ship caption but a dictator as well. The crew is deemed to risk their lives for the captain’s sake no matter the circumstances since their choices are limited to either dying by jumping off the boat or

Along with this we also see the fate behind his decisions, where many things go against him, illustrating that maybe catching this whale really isn’t the greatest of ideas. A really good example of this is when the Pequeod finally reaches the equator and they appear to be close to where Ahab believes the whale may be, however when they get there they encounter two other ships who have been hit really badly by the whale. When all fate and destine is clearly illustrating that Ahab’s best bet is to not fight this battle, his free-will and determination push him forward, and he doesn’t allow this to scare him. Ahab even eventually goes as far as saying, “The gallows, ye mean.- I am immortal then, on land and on sea," cried Ahab, with a laugh of derision;- "Immortal on land and on sea!” (Melville 513). This demonstrates just how free-will driven Ahab really is, and he believes his destiny lies at sea, stating that his destiny is that he is immortal. Even when going beyond the text and further researching this concept of free will in Ahab’s character, we find that most other scholastic articles can agree with Ahab’s drive. When reading “Moby-dick Again” by Richard Lowry, he states in text, “When he catches up to Moby Dick, the climactic three-day chase ensues, with repeated opportunities to turn back as the danger

He reminds the sailors of their promise, stating, “‘All your oaths to hunt the White Whale are as binding as mine; and heart, soul, and body, lungs and life, old Ahab is bound’” (522). This intense statement calls on the honor of the men, prompting their memories of the night when they swore to assist Ahab on his hunt. He uses hyperbole in this statement to emphasize the seriousness of their pledge; he claims that his entire being binds him to this course, when truly only insanity and the need for revenge drives him, but the sailors better understand the gravity of their journey on the Pequod. Ahab continues: “‘And that ye may know to what tune this heart beats; look ye here; thus I blow out the last fear!’ And with one blast of his breath he extinguished the flame” (522). The corposants appear to symbolize the escalating fear of the sailors throughout the chapter— the more scared the sailors, the brighter the flame. Ahab capitalizes on that symbolism and “extinguishes” the fear of the sailors by blowing out the corposant. Thus Ahab brings the sailors down from the height of their terror and reminds them of their binding oath at the beginning of the

I think Ahab is mad, just the way he is and talk about thing like I think this man is crazy like he lost his mind. He thinks its his prophecy that he had to go dismember the whale that got him, hes just crazy, hes just so obsessed with catch this whale and kill it. Ahab considers Moby Dick the embodiment of evil in the world, and he pursues the White Whale like theirs nothing else in the world to do but hat and because he believes it his inescapable fate to destroy this evil. Ahab suffers from a fatal flaw that is not necessarily inborn but instead stems from damage, in his case both psychological and physical, inflicted by life in a harsh world. Hes trying to fight something that's not really worth fighting.

His most famous book, Moby Dick, features the observant narrator, Ishmael, aboard the Pequot, a ship captained by the menacing one-legged Captain Ahab. Having lost his limb in a previous voyage to an enormous sperm whale named Moby Dick, Ahab scans the seven seas in manic search of revenge against the giant. Queequeg, Ishmael’s menacing best friend, and the rest of the crew are subjected to extreme jeopardy and later death due to Ahab’s monomaniacal disregard for bad omens and danger. The whale slices the boat clean in half and none survive to tells of its greatness except Ishmael.

Moby-Dick is considered to be one of, if not the, best novels in American history. Harper & Brothers first published it in 1851 in New York. In England, it was published in the same year under the title, The Whale (“Moby Dick”). Melville explores topics and themes that were scarcely spoken of and never even seen in a novel. In the novel, the Pequod, which is the ship, is named after a Native American tribe that was exterminated when the white settlers arrived. It is a symbol of death and doom and foreshadows event that occur later in the novel. Melville brings some very controversial themes to light in the novel. Revenge is one of the main themes of Dark Romanticism and Melville uses it to drive every action taken by Ahab. This is seen early on in the novel as Ahab explains to the crew why he has a peg leg and that he wants to enact his revenge on Moby Dick (Melville 160-161). “Moby Dick is, fundamentally, a revenge tragedy. It’s about one man’s maniacal obsession with vengeance. It’s about finding an object on which to pin all you anger and fear and rage, not only about your own suffering, but also about the suffering of all mankind” (“Moby

Explain Ahab’s last speech found at the top of page 623 through the end of the paragraph ending with “Thus, I give up the spear.” In what way is Moby Dick a “…all-destroying but unconquering

While Ahab was still the obedient captain he once was, he was one of the most successful and higher rewarding captains. Unexpectedly, in the midst of a whaling, Ahab and his crew encountered the whale he now refers to as “Moby Dick” or “the white whale.” The crew initiated in capturing the whale, but this whale was different. Rather than capturing the whale, the whale captured Ahab and though Ahab escaped, he did not escape entirely. Moby Dick had dismembered and consumed half of one of Ahab’s legs. Ever since this incident, Ahab’s one and only desire or, as stated in the text, “...his one unsleeping, ever-pacing thought” has been to kill Moby Dick; which soon turns him obsessive (Melville). Ahab would not let anyone or anything stop him from achieving his goal, “...’I’ll chase him ‘round Good Hope, and ‘round the Horn, and ‘round the Norway Maelstrom, and ‘round

Initially, Melville creates a metaphor to illustrate one of Ahab’s most prominent physical features: the scar along his face and neck. In Ishmael’s chapter describing his first impression of Ahab, he writes: “Threading its way out from among his grey hairs, and continuing right down one side of his tawny scorched face and neck…you saw a slender rod-like mark….It resembled that perpendicular seam sometimes made in the straight, lofty trunk of a great tree, when the upper lightning tearingly darts down it, and without wrenching a single twig, peels and grooves out the bark from top to bottom…leaving the tree still greenly alive, but branded” (108-109). Ishmael compares Ahab’s long, ropy scar to the mark left on a tree by a lightning strike, giving the reader a vivid image of the intensity of the mark on Ahab’s face. In contrast, a later simile is constructed to describe Ahab’s demeanor as opposed to his physical appearance. Ishmael likens Ahab’s presence to that of a regal sea-lion: “Over his ivory-inlaid table, Ahab presided like a mute, maned sea-lion on the white coral beach, surrounded by his war-like but deferential cubs” (128). The idea of Ahab as such a domineering character reinforces his ultimate dictatorial power on the Pequod. He rules the ship exactly as if he was a lion and the crew members were his physically strong but deferential cubs. Finally, Melville crafts a simile to convey Ahab’s passion for hunting the white whale: “‘…it was Moby Dick that dismasted me; Moby Dick that brought me to this dead stump I stand on now. Aye, aye,’ he shouted with a terrific, loud, animal sob, like that of a heart-stricken moose” (139). Melville expresses Ahab’s desire to find and kill Moby Dick by depicting how passionately Ahab displays his wishes to his crew. By comparing Ahab’s sob to that of a grieving moose, Melville

Herman Melville, in his renowned novel Moby-Dick, presents the tale of the determined and insanely stubborn Captain Ahab as he leads his crew, the men of the Pequod, in revenge against the white whale. A crew mixed in age and origin, and a young, logical narrator named Ishmael sail with Ahab. Cut off from the rest of society, Ahab attempts to make justice for his personal loss of a leg to Moby Dick on a previous voyage, and fights against the injustice he perceived in the overwhelming forces that surround him. Melville uses a series of gams, social interactions or simple exchanges of information between whaling ships at sea, in order to more clearly present man’s situation as he faces an existence whose meaning he cannot fully grasp.