Only three days left in the Metropolitan Playhouse’s Melvillapalooza fest, which has been going on for the last few weeks: original plays, poetry readings, and general Melville-inspired mayhem on E. 4th St.
Several of the remaining events are free (though they require reservations as seating is limited), including the final “scholar’s roundtable” on Sunday evening at 7:00 pm. The roundtable will be made up of — ahem — the two of us plus our colleague Thomas Augst, who wrote about Melville in his book on nineteenth-century clerks in the city and is the author of our Melville chapter in the forthcoming Cambridge Companion. We’ll be talking about Bartleby, Ishmael, and Pierre, showing some slides of Melville’s New York, and eliciting lots of audience participation.
So if you’re inclined, as I am, to fall on your knees and thank the deity of your choice for producing someone who wrote so much fantastic prose, head on over to metropolitanplayhouse.org and save a seat or two. Hope to see you there!
Potentially dumb question, but what is your preferred edition of Moby-Dick? I somehow escaped grade school never having to read the thing, and am determined to get around to it – especially now that I’m hearing more people discuss the cosmopolitan threads in it (Amitav Ghosh’s inspiration of sorts for Sea of Poppies, he’s repeatedly said). A professor of mine has joked that Moby-Dick is like the Bible – every American family has a copy, but no one in the household has ever actually read it. So, my question to you: Is there a definitive edition? One with the best woodcuts?
Not a dumb question, and I assume most people get out of college, let alone grade school, without reading it. (Maybe that was a typo for “grad school”?)
I do divide the world into people who’ve read it, people who haven’t, and people who lie about it, and the ones I like best are usually the ones who’ve read it. But it’s not an easy task. I’d suggest reading the Norton Critical Edition. It helps to have some notes right in front of you. I’d also suggest a couple strategies: think of the chapters like little capsules. Take one or two at a time. Don’t feel like you have to swallow the whole at once. See what you get out of the individual units.
If you get bogged down, read it out loud. Melville loves the sounds of words and uses them to full effect. If you need to take a break, set it aside and pick it up later.
In the chapters that seem to be only about the natural history of whales, look for everything that’s *not* actually about whales. For example, when he compares whales to various sizes and types of books, think about what’s being said about books, not just about whales.
Anyway, hope those help. Good luck!