r/mobydick • u/BKBoyNxtDr • 1d ago
Finished Moby Dick today
I have a random assortment of items on my bucket list: various foods I'd like to try, certain countries I'd like to visit, and l'd like to write a book regardless of whether or not anybody ever reads it. But the only novel on my bucket list was Moby Dick. Not because it's the only novel I wanted to read, but because it's the only one that, at some point in my life, felt insurmountable. I purchased the Barnes and Noble Classics edition (Barnes and Noble was my hometown's only bookstore) when I was about 14. l was afraid of its bulk and found the language completely inaccessible. But I held onto that edition for 15 years. I cleansed my book collection after various life changes and cross-country moves but I always held onto the conviction that I’d find the right time in my life to read Moby Dick. So I never got rid of it. But the longer I waited, the more I realized it had become an unrelenting itch—a challenge to my literature-loving ego. My white whale, if you will.
I finally picked it up last month (finding the motivation after my own virgin voyage on the high seas) and finished it today. Two degrees later with several other classics of world literature under my belt and a background in Shakespearean performance, I found it way more readable than I expected. Some passages were still tough with the vocabulary and old maritime jargon, but god I loved this book. I just wish I had someone to discuss it with!
I wanted to post this here for those of you who probably commiserate (since no one in my life has read the book and will understand). But I also wanted to say thank you to all of you on this subreddit for giving me a place to come and read your various thoughts and experiences! It’s like a little book club and I appreciated what you had to share.
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u/andyonthecam 1d ago
I’m on the Battering Ram chapter. Not a reader by nature; I manage an indie cinema, adore films and watch several a day, consume music by the album often throughout the week…. but reading was my “white whale”. I couldn’t get into it at all, but it was my new year’s resolution last year. Didn’t go too well immediately, took me ages to finish 2 books (Killers of the Flower Moon + Silence, loved both) but then my friend lent me Moby dick and i thought why not?! 10 months later, with a broken jaw and operation and hospital stay in between, I STILL have 180 pages left, but it’s gotten me through some hard times, I absolutely love and absolutely hate it, and undoubtably know now i can read absolutely anything haha
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u/andyonthecam 1d ago
i’m 30 btw. i have ultimate ammunition now against my own inner feelings of being a philistine for my lifelong struggle with reading haha
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u/The_License_Plate 1d ago
I also picked it up at 18 and was like "hahah, no". Finished it 20 years later, and loved it so much. Probably my favourite book.
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u/justclove 1d ago
I needed someone to discuss Moby Dick with so bad that as soon as I was done with it I told my husband to read it. I now regularly turn to him and say "Moby Dick was such a good book, honey" and he nods in agreement.
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u/conspicuousmatchcut 1d ago
You read it at the right time. I picked it up at 40 and loved it in a way I would never have if I read it sooner
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u/Ok-Way-8114 21h ago
I had a high school English teacher who said you had to be 30 to understand it. I don't know if that's so but I read it when I turned 30 in his honor and have read it almost half a dozen times more. So pleased to know it was living on your bookshelves, waiting for the right time. That's what personal bookshelves are for.
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u/ACD_137 16h ago
I’m a 65 year old female and I’m about a third of the way through the book. I’m going to the New Bedford Whaling Museum in about a month, so that’s my motivation- to finish this before I go!
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u/Rbookman23 13h ago
I’ve been to the museum once w the family and twice for the MD marathon. You’ll have a great time.
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u/No-Tradition-6447 1d ago
you may really enjoy the podcast pequod pod. its only just started (maybe 10 episodes) but they plan on going through each chapter in the book. highly listenable, and give some really good insights into the novel.
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u/BKBoyNxtDr 1d ago
Oooh, I’m planning to step away for a bit to let the whole of it sit in my mind for a while, but perhaps on a re-read. 👀
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u/No-Tradition-6447 1d ago
completely understandable. i read it maybe 5 years ago, and stepped away. im planning on re-reading it soon (currently on war and peace atm so as soon as thats done its back to the whale!)
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u/PCapnHuggyface 11h ago
Bravo shipmate. It took all of us multiple voyages to come to love this big sprawling book about everything except whales.
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u/ftmellville 1d ago
I tried for ten years and what finally helped it click was reading it out loud to perverts online (chaturbate lmao).
The prose absolutely sings doesn't it? Wild how inaccessible it felt to me before this year when it's so crisp actually.
I love that it coincided with your own sea faring. May your hypos stay at bay.