If you’ve ever wondered about the ongoing fervor surrounding Moby Dick, Philip Hoare writing for The Guardian delves into the curiously futuristic aspects of the novel (which was an abject failure when originally released). In the novel Melville foreshadows mass species extinctions, climate disruption, same-sex marriage (between Ishmael and Queequeg), and introduces a host of subversive ideas that resonate even in the modern age with analogies to the abundant failures of imperialism and toxic effects of slavery on the nascent US republic.
Hoare makes it a point to steer readers (perhaps better called listeners) to the audiobook version he helped curate, Moby Dick, Big Read. Individual chapters are read by a slate of narrators, many well recognized as actors and creatives, and although the shift in voices and approaches can be a bit disconcerting, the overall performances lend themselves well to a better understanding the depth and range of this multi-faceted novel.
The perspective offered by Hoare is refreshing and the insights are more than enough justification for why Melville’s work has endured and affected so many other artists.
For there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men. – Herman Melville
