Moby Dick

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1

THE SPOUTER INN

P. 5

CHAPTER 2

THE PEQUOD

P. 17

CHAPTER 3

THE HUNT

P. 29

CHAPTER 4

AHAB’S OBSESSION

P. 39

CHAPTER 5

THE FINAL BATTLE

P. 47

CHAPTER 1

THE SPOUTER INN

Call me Ishmael.

Some years ago, I found myself with very little money in my wallet but, above all, in a gray mood, so gray that I saw no other solution than to go to sea.

When I felt that way, I could do nothing better than get aboard a ship, not as a passenger who buys a ticket and takes a seat in a cabin, but as a humble sailor who gets paid little for toiling above and below deck every day, and in return can sail the oceans for months without having anything before him other than the horizon.

So, I left Manhattan and headed for the town of New Bedford, where boats left for Nantucket and where I had decided I would join the crew of a whaling ship. When I arrived in New Bedford it was already night and I had missed the last voyage to my destination. I therefore found myself forced to count the little money I had and look for accommodation for the night.

THE PEQUOD

A few more weeks passed before the ship sailed. Loading the provisions and what was necessary for such a long voyage was no small matter, and the work went on for a long time while Queequeg and I continued to stay at the boarding house. When news reached us that we were to leave the following dawn, we carried all our belongings into the Pequod’s hold and slept on dry land for the last time; then, on a very cold December day, we took to the sea.

Sometimes it happened, during the voyage, that we came across another ship. Immediately the crew would make particular signs to allow themselves to be identified, and the same happened with the other crew. Every American whaler was logged in a large ledger; when the Pequod came face-to-face with one such ship, therefore, Captain Ahab checked and understood that it was the Jeroboam. When a long wooden beam was passed from the deck of the vessel to the other so that the captain of the Jeroboam might visit the Pequod, the sailors cried that an epidemic was afoot. Ahab, however, invited him to board the ship anyway; the other captain preferred to use a boat to get close to the Pequod and talk to him without the danger of infecting him. Ahab asked him if they had seen a white whale. Captain Mayhew had heard of the wicked Moby Dick and his killings—the creature was guilty of drowning a whaling ship’s second mate who had leapt after it with a harpoon.

During those days a terrible storm struck the Pequod, and for a whole night the ship was thrown around by very high waves. We risked losing many sailors and we feared sinking. Captain Ahab didn’t want to use the lightning rods that the ship had to release electrical charges into the sea, thus putting the ship and the entire crew in very serious danger. The first officer seemed to find no peace in the face of the decisions of his captain. When eventually the storm passed, and the calm of a new day found the ship not too badly damaged, except for the sails, which were soon replaced, we continued our voyage. Ahab went up on deck and watched the sky and the position of the sun; after a few moments, he shouted, “We’re not sailing east, we’re sailing west!”

The terrible storm of the previous night had affected the compasses, which no longer showed the correct direction.

THE FINAL BATTLE

Ahab wanted to be placed as a lookout at the top of the mast and was therefore hoisted by ropes to the top because with his bone leg he would never have been able to climb. He spent day and night watching the waves, his eyes red and mad. Then, one morning, he began to sniff the air. “I can smell him, Moby Dick is near!” he exclaimed concentrating even more on the horizon. It was the captain himself who first sighted the white hump emerging from the sea, and he began to shout: “There! There! The spout, it’s him! The monster is there! The gold doubloon is mine, I was the first to see him!”

All the crew crowded on the deck to finally see the creature that they had been pursuing for months and had by now become the protagonist of their nightmares.

“At sea, three boats! Starbuck, you stay at the helm!” shouted Ahab. While the first mate remained on the Pequod, three boats plowed the oil-flat ocean; at the head was Ahab with

impassive-faced Fedallah as harpooner.

The sailors rowed silently and got closer and closer to the great white sperm whale; only the top of his wrinkled head and the upper part of his white body were visible.

His movements were placid and calm, the water around the massive bulk seemed to gently caress his hips. Like a wolf in sheep’s clothing, he continued to swim without showing that he had noticed the boats approaching.

Then, all of a sudden, he sank and finally we were able to see his whole body and his fearsome tail before he disappeared from our sight into the darkness of the ocean.

Ahab himself no longer had his false leg, only a broken stump; the sailors were counted, and it soon became clear that Fedallah was missing.

“It’s not possible! Fedallah! It cannot be!” said Ahab. But the sailors had witnessed the man being dragged into the depths by Moby Dick.

“Quick, then! We can’t stop now!” continued the captain, out of his mind. Starbuck’s prayers begging him to stop and leave the white sperm whale to its fate were to no avail.

For the rest of the day and night the sperm whale did not appear, but Ahab continued to wait for him.

Suddenly, on the third day’s chase, the white spout loomed in the distance; once again the captain left the first mate on the Pequod and lowered the boats.