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I’m looking forward to seeing the turnout!

In “The Carpenter,” Ishmael examines the duality of mankind as consumers. On one hand, humans think of themselves as individuals with thoughts and actions as varying as snowflakes. On the other hand, humans are identical in that they are largely driven by the fulfillment of needs and wants. As a result, men become defined by their consumption — both as individuals (what they want), and as a species (merely the fact that they want).

Ishmael finds a telling byproduct of this aspect of mankind in the ship’s carpenter, a jack of all trades who exists solely to fill those individualistic wants all other men seek to satisfy — from the practical bird cage to the absurd and frivolous decoration of oars. In the man who exists solely to give men what they lack, we end up seeing what men truly lack — an indifference to the material world, and a transcendence of desire.

The carpenter is a man apart. He has seen in volume the essence of man, and he has seen what a shallow essence it truly is. And in so seeing, the carpenter has freed himself to become his own person.

Chapter 107: The Carpenter

You take a man alone
And he’s an island of soul,
You take them all at once
And what’s the difference?

Well, every man alive
Thinks he’s an island of soul,
But every man alive
Is just a duplicate:

One wants an ear drilled,
One wants a bird cage,
Stubb wants stars on every oar!

But this equation of man
Comes out to negative one,
And it’s The Carpenter’s soul
That makes the difference:

Come for an ear drilled,
Come for a bird cage,
He’ll paint stars on every oar!

He’s the difference,
Difference;
He’s the difference.

Well he’s a man at odds,
He’s every interest,
And as he fills the needs
He stands indifferent.

There’s not a man alive
Who stands indifferent,
But he’s a man we prize
To be indifferent.

Come for an ear drilled,
Come for a bird cage,
He’ll paint stars on every oar!

He’s indifferent,
Different;
He’s indifferent.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea July 15, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea December 11, 2010

Throughout Moby-Dick, readers are often confronted with the idea of meaning as a function of perception. As early as chapter three, we see Ishmael viewing a painting and literally inventing the narrative of it as he sees what he sees in its age-obscured forms. We can imply what this moment suggests about each of us in the real world — our consciousness filters great masses of sensory input and creates a narrative to make sense of the things it deems important. This idea has great implications for literature. If meaning does not exist intrinsically in the world, we must see a story more as a reflection of its teller than of some independent truth in the world.

Melville plays with this idea throughout the book — for example, Ishmael telling the story of Stubb telling the story of Queequeg using his tattoos to tell the story of Ahab’s doubloon. “Queen Mab,” adds its own twist in making the interpreted object itself a creation of consciousness; i.e., a dream.

What may seem like a minor distinction interests me for two reasons. First, we as readers get a double insight into Stubb’s character, both in the images he creates in dreams, and in the meaning he attaches to those images. Second, the situation confronts us with an often uncomfortable idea of being a stranger to one’s own self, as well as the even more uncomfortable thought that even our selves have no absolute meaning beyond that which we, or others, attach in observation. Stubb sees himself as highly estimable. Ahab’s actions may imply that he sees Stubb as quite the opposite. Are both versions of Stubb equally valid? Does Stubb have proprietary rights to defining Stubb? Wisely, Stubb bypasses these questions entirely by interpreting Ahab’s kick as a great honor.

Chapter 31: Queen Mab

Listen to me, Flask, a curious thing
Came to me as advice in last night’s dream.
Ahab kicked me with his ivory leg,
Then his base widened to a pyramid.

I had a night to be
Alone, steeped in a wondrous dream.
Rise, oh, Queen Mab, arise,
And hush each of our players’ sighs!

So I kicked his geometric strength
As I thought to myself at some great length –
He didn’t kick me with a living foot . . .
It matters. It matters!

I had a night to be
Alone, steeped in a wondrous dream.
Rise, oh, Queen Mab, arise,
And hush each of our players’ sighs!

Then a merman came to lecture me
On the blessed abuse of royalty –
Every kick from Ahab makes you wise,
And at least he didn’t kick with common pine!

I had a night to be
Alone, steeped in a wondrous dream.
Rise, oh, Queen Mab, arise,
And hush each of our players’ sighs!

Rise, oh, Queen Mab, arise,
And hush each of our players’ sighs!

(c) and (p) 2009 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 12, 2009
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea August 14, 2010

Reading back one paragraph, for example, when Ishmael recalls “Queequeg now and then affectionately throwing his brown tattooed legs over mine, and then drawing them back,” I can’t help but think that Ishmael notices race as existing only by contrast. When Ishmael discusses Queequeg’s smoking in bed in terms of the landlord’s insurance policy, I can’t help but think that culture exists only in contrast as well. And when Ishmael ruminates over how “no man can ever feel his own identity aright except his eyes be closed,” it makes me think how people often define the self in contrast to the other.

Defining existence in terms of the other may seem alienating and bleak, but I think Ishmael makes the opposite point in “Nightgown.” Even in negative moments of contrast — for example, the fairly innocuous struggle between Ishmael and Queequeg over smoking in bed — contrast can only exist when people are close to each other, recognizing each other; and the individual self can only exist in the presence of society and even perhaps friendship. And so we watch as two very different people come to terms with each other, and in the process realize not only each other, but themselves as well.

Chapter 11: Nightgown

The world is far away, oh!, far away
And my friend’s near.
Underneath a blanket, oh!, with a friend
That I hold dear.

But our warmth would not exist without the cold,
As our loneliness, without someone to hold!
I’m glad I’ve got my friend!

Intertwine our legs, oh!, and our race
Is oh so clear,
But what is in our race, oh!, but a contrast
When two are near?

Well, at least we’re here together, heart to heart!
Many others choose to live apart!
I’m glad I’ve got my friend!

Oh, our warmth would not exist without the cold,
As our loneliness, without someone to hold!
I’m glad I’ve got my friend!

The world is far away, oh!, far away
And my friend’s near.

(c) and (p) 2009 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 10, 2009
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea August 7, 2010

In the previous chapter, Ishmael introduces his readers to a substance called ambergris. Ambergris fetches exceptionally high prices, both for its use as a fragrance in cosmetics, and to a lesser extent as a flavoring in wine and food. Some might find it ironic that such a luxurious substance comes from the bowels of a sick whale — a lubricant of sorts to help sharp bones and squid beaks pass through the intestines.

Ishmael — American, democratic — does not find the fact of luxury grown from base origins the least bit ironic, nor does he humor the reputations of whales (or whalemen) as smelling badly. These rumors, says Ishmael, are certainly based in truth — Northern whaling ships carry blubber back to port to try out the oil, rather than trying the oil out at sea, and the stored blubber stinks as it begins to decay. But in good health — in the freedom of the outdoors — a whale more often smells like “a musk-scented lady” who “rustles her dress in a warm parlor.”

Ishmael certainly points in metaphor here to the democratic gentility of hard work, an elevation of working men and women from an esteem of dishonor to one of new-found glory. To me, the metaphor also points at the inverse — a gluttonous, slothful aristocracy masking the smell of poor health with the smell of wealth and circumstance. In this metaphor, the smell of wealth is actually the smell of rot — digested waste from the innards of a creature majestic in its natural freedom, not unlike the American worker.

Chapter 92: Ambergris

Three cheers for the atmosphere,
To good health in the coming years,
To all smells foul, and to the sweet aroma
Born from the wretched, blossomed in the corner.

Hey, hey, we’re only what we own.
Hey, hey, we’re gonna own the form!

St. Paul dancing at the ball –
From dishonor to the glory tall.
Wake, baby, wake — it’s only in the water!
Change what you take, and change the holy order!

Hey, hey, we’re only what we own.
Hey, hey, we’re gonna own the form!

Wake, baby, wake — it’s only in the water!
Change what you take, and change the holy order!
Wake, baby, wake! Wake, baby, wake!
Wake, baby, wake! Wake, baby, wake!

(c) and (p) 2009 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea July 25, 2009
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea May 29, 2010

These are the circumstances with which we meet the Rose-bud, a French whaling vessel almost as incompetent as the German vessel we met a few chapters earlier. Unlike the German ship, whose crew furiously chased whales but couldn’t apprehend them, the Rose-bud has chosen to scavenge for whales already dead in the water. Ishmael identifies both of the whales found by the Rose-bud as “blasted” whales, or whales which have “died unmolested on the sea.” Despite all evidence to support Ishmael’s assessment, Stubb insists that one of the whales in question was harpooned and drugged by the Pequod in an earlier chase and, though lost to them at the time, should not belong to the scavenging Frenchmen. Identifying the other scavenged whale as potentially containing valuable ambergris, Stubb plots his revenge.* Though played out as humorous, the trick Stubb plays on the French captain, with the help of a Guernsey-man on board, is not only deceitful, but insulting, demeaning, and cruel.** In short, like the rotting whales, Stubb’s behavior turns both the nose and the stomach.

Our culture uses a variety of metaphors to optimistically suggest goodness in the heart of badness — pearl in the oyster, oasis in the desert, diamond in the rough, clouds with silver linings***, etc. — but Stubb’s trickery and greed turns the metaphor on its head somewhat. What do we make of a situation where a sweet smell found amidst a stench suggests a deeper, far less superficial kind of rot? Has the self-serving ethos of capitalism deprived us of any true optimism?

*Ambergris is a fatty, oily substance found in the intestines of sick whales, possibly a sort of lubricant for ingested irritants. Used for cosmetics and perfumes, ambergris was even more valuable than oil.

**Guernsey is an English island off the coast of France.

***Or Zinc linings, according to Alex P. Keaton.

Chapter 91: The Pequod meets the Rose-bud

From the heart of the stench
A rose-bud blooms,
A rose-bud blooms for the day.

The brilliant devise,
A posture to prize,
The moment’s luck from dismay.

As adjoining streams
Join as one, kneeling
Through the banks of probable decay,
Cannot claim perfume
Into rotten wounds,
May your sweetness live above the day!

Tides of the stench
Will ebb and flow,
And you, untouched, my Amber-Gray.

As adjoining streams
Join as one, kneeling
Through the banks of probable decay,
Cannot claim perfume
Into rotten wounds,
May your sweetness live above the day!

From the heart of the stench
A rose-bud blooms,
A rose-bud blooms for the day.

Tides of the stench
Will ebb and flow,
And you, untouched, my Amber-Gray.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea October 9, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea November 7, 2009

Ishmael sets the tone of “Cetology” by telling us that “though of real knowledge [about whales] there be little, yet of books there are a plenty.” Rather than adding to the blather, Ishmael attempts a new kind of classification, admitting it will not be complete and accurate, but nevertheless wanting to establish a proper method. Though noble in intent, Ishmael makes a fatal error in allowing his science to follow, rather than inform, popular belief. For example, based on his discussions with whalemen, Ishmael decides that whales are fish despite their having lungs, warm blood, and a horizontal tail like other aquatic or amphibious mammals. He also uses popular names for each whale even when noting that the names aren’t specific or descriptive. Most strangely, Ishmael decides to classify whales based on their size, which seems too broad and superficial for science.

In explaining his choice to classify based on size, Ishmael says that all other classifiable features are shared by whales that have nothing else in common. Furthermore, if you really get down to the inner workings of each whale, “you will not find distinctions a fiftieth part as available to the systematizer as those external ones already enumerated.”

In one sense, “Cetology” speaks to me as a critique of the concept of race. Cliche though it may be, we’re all the same inside, and classifying humans according to skin tone is no less arbitrary than classifying whales by size. When Ishmael says that the Right Whale is mistakenly considered the largest whale because of “the long priority of its claims,” I can’t help but think about the world’s minority white population claiming dominance throughout history. In another sense, “Cetology” perfectly contributes to Ishmael’s discussions of class and rank in the several chapters preceding and following it. In “Cetology,” Ishmael furthers his ongoing story of the human need to rank and classify itself, and the false science that is often used in the service of base prejudice.

Ch 32: Cetology

You decide,
And science will accommodate!
You decide,
And science will allow,
For your base impressions
To rule their calculated epiphanies.
Spread it on the breeze,
And deep into the seas.

We’re the same inside,
But you can’t oppress a man,
So they must
Be of beast –
Well they live like beasts.

You decide!
For your base impressions
To rule their calculated epiphanies.
Spread it on the breeze,
And deep into the seas.

Let the science ride;
Be as simple as you can!
Darker skin: different race,
Harder work, submissive face,
Speak eugenically!

You decide,
And science will accommodate!
You decide,
And science will allow
For your base impressions
To rule their calculated epiphanies.
Spread it on the breeze,
And deep into the seas.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 9, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea February 9, 2009

Enter Chapter 112, “The Blacksmith,” a proletariat anthem for sure. I have to admit, it took me several reads to get any kind of plot out of the chapter, obscured as it is by all the trumpets flaring for capital L Labor. The story follows the Pequod’s blacksmith, a man named Perth, who was “an artisan of famed excellence.” Perth had it all — a loving wife, three children, a thriving business, and a “cheerful-looking church” to visit every Sunday. Perth’s workshop is connected to his home, and the beat of his hammer echos through the house as a heartbeat for his domestic life. Interesting here is the equation of productive industry and happiness. Perth’s wife listens with “…vigorous pleasure, to the stout ringing of her young-armed old husband’s hammer.” Ishmael also notes that “…to stout Labor’s iron lullaby, the blacksmith’s infants were rocked to slumber.” All was happy until Perth began to drink: “The blows of the basement hammer every day grew more and more between; and each blow every day grew fainter than the last; the wife sat frozen at the window, with tearless eyes, glitteringly gazing into the weeping faces of her children; the forge choked up with cinders…” and on and on until Perth’s wife and children are dead and buried, with Perth thinking of sending himself along soon after. As industry collapses, the very fabric of domesticity crumbles. Workshops and factories are the basement foundation of family life; the labor within its heartbeat.

Interesting then the death and rebirth metaphor as Perth moves into a kind of labor distinctly separate from any usual form of domestic life. Interesting how Perth’s hammer becomes the heartbeat of a different kind of family, a family of laborers, a camaraderie between workers, shall we say, hmm? We are breaking from labor as a support for self and moving to labor as a support for all, a communal life, if you will. And labor once again validates Perth’s existence. He is purposeful; he is alive.

And I meanwhile, live a great anxiety when I don’t manage to write a song every day, or only make it three-fourths of the way through a recording in a weekend. My heart seems to beat a little slower. My life seems a little less justified. Here’s to each man and woman; here’s to the hammer each of us patiently beats. Here’s to the collective effort towards a more thoughtful and more beautiful world. May our industry thrive.

Chapter 112: The Blacksmith

Find me the mercy of evasion,
My only testament taken
Upon the desolate sea.
The only merciful.

Beat with a stoical compassion:
I’ll bring my hammer to you,
I’ll bring my hammer to you.

Launch from everything tried.
Cast the living world aside.
It’s a fully sheltered lee
But how could you?

Ode to the infinite and drifting –
By possibility lured.

‘Cause it happened.
Oh, ’cause it happened,
My hammer patiently beats.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea July 28, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 29, 2008