The last night of our residency at Pianos (March 29) will be Film Night — we’ll show films about Moby-Dick from 7:00-8:00 before the music starts at 8:15.

Who supplies these films? You do. This is an open call to anyone who would like to make a film about Moby-Dick. Your film can be related to Call Me Ishmael songs (i.e.; a music video or a filmic representation of a song) or not — feel free to do whatever you want, as long as it’s about Moby-Dick.

Rules:

1) Your film must be about Moby-Dick in some way.

2) Your film must be 1 minute or less.

3) Your film must have a budget of $100 or less.

4) Submissions are due by February 15.

We will screen as many of the best entries as we can in an hour, and the audience will vote on a winner.

Prizes:

1st place — 1/2 of 1/3 (or 1/6) of donations we take at the door

2nd place — 1/4 of 1/3 (or 1/12) of donations we take at the door

3rd place — 1/4 of 1/3 (or 1/12) of donations we take at the door

That’s not as complicated as it sounds! We’re looking forward to watching what you make. We’re viewing entries on a rolling schedule; in other words, we’ll watch them as soon as we get them. Once all the submissions are in, we’ll let you know if you made the final screening. All submissions will also be submitted to a Moby-Dick festival this summer in Pittsfield, MA (unless you opt out)!

To submit your work:

1) Export your film. Codec, H.264; Data Rate, 5000 kbps; Frame Size, 720×480. Audio Codec, AAC; Data Rate, 256 kbps; Sample Rate, 44.1 kHz.

2) Compress (.zip) a folder containing your film (use your email address as the name of your file), as well as an .rtf or .pdf containing your name and contact info, the name of your film, a one sentence description of the film for the program (don’t Jack London this sentence, please), and a one sentence description of you for the program (ditto on no long sentence constructions).

3) Either use SendSpace or a similar download option, and email a link for download to dotheleeshore@gmail.com .

4) All submissions are due by February 15.

Speaking of endings and beginnings, this is the end of my work here as well. Three years ago, I started reading Moby-Dick and writing the songs recorded and written about throughout this blog. In the course of those three years I got married, had a baby, changed jobs, began to learn a new instrument, and undergone as many other of the smaller changes life presents us with in the course of time. I’ve learned a lot in the process as well, as a songwriter, as a musician, as a recorder of music, as a reader, as a writer, and as a person. That learning has made my ending here something of a beginning, too — I’ve already started working on my next two projects. Thanks to all for listening, reading, and commenting — it’s been fun.

Epilogue

Now but clipped of wing,
I circle ’round an empty scene
As if cradled in descent
By solitude.

Dirge of wandering,
Buoyed by a lost belief,
Irrevocable as all
Eternal vows.

There’s always a peace that lives between the punished
And the punisher, therein lies the defeat.

In the desert marked,
A signal to the world of sharks
That a punished man must live
To tell the tale.

Oh, the many morbid things
That the Fates obliquely sing
To the poets
Through a man come tumbling down.

You can call me Ishmael,
May the muse speak through me well
As I sing to you
The world’s most principle song.

And how
He
Looms in the middle of it all
Spectacularly.

(c) and (p) 2008 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 24, 2008
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 26, 2011

Imagine this same crew rounding the Cape of Good Hope, also called Cape Tormentoso by less optimistic sailors of the past. The Pequod meets the rough waters of the cape with a dark outlook — the choppy waters become “demonaic,” the high winds “howl,” and the sea ravens that perch in the riggings do so not because they are birds in need of rest, but because “they deemed our ship some drifting, uninhabited craft; a thing appointed to desolation, and therefore [a] fit roosting-place for their homeless selves.”

Ahab, of course, thrives in this mood of misery begun by him and magnified in the many men of his crew. I sense in this chapter the beginnings of a negative feedback loop, with Ahab creating in his men the very misery that drives him further into madness.

Chapter 51: The Spirit-Spout

How now, Fedallah, you give us a fright
Up on the mast-head at night –
If you’re searching for misery,
You’ll find it alright.

Seen in the moonlight a silvery spout,
And followed, we utter devout –
Tranced by our misery
And beckoned without.

All in good time you’ll realize
That everything’s white in the moonlight;
It’s a trick of the night.

Birds beat the black air, relentlessly fleet;
Fish leap in tormented sea –
Trapped by their misery
And condemned to repeat.

Promise, exalted from deepest despair,
What else, a fountain so fair? –
It’s only our misery
Finally laid bare.

All in good time you’ll realize
That everything’s white in the moonlight;
It’s a trick of the night.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 19, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 15, 2011

Expect to see volumes 6-8 in the next couple of months, and then a re-release of volumes 1-4, with improved track spacing and better equalization of song-to-song volume levels. Those of you who have already purchased volumes 1, 2, 3, or 4 can write me if you want a free upgrade to the new versions when they are available.

I have two posts left! Be sure to stop over for the next two weeks.

Providing some comic relief in the dark moments leading up to the story’s ultimate dark moment, the Pequod crosses paths with a Nantucket whaler called the Bachelor, which is homeward bound after a stroke of exceptional luck. Not only had the Bachelor’s crew managed to fill the hold to its bulging limit, they had to give away food provisions to make room for more oil. If that weren’t enough, the crew had conspicuously lashed additional barrels of oil to the mast, to the deck, and to every last possible nook or cranny of the ship that could accommodate.

Thus decked out, the Bachelor decides to make its last rounds of the cruising ground with banners and flags streaming, with the crew banging on drum skins stretched over the try pots while singing and dancing on the deck with their newly wedded Polynesian wives. The whole scene is over the top to the opposite degree of Ahab and the Pequod. As the ships cross paths, we realize just how ridiculous Ahab’s moodiness (to which we’ve become accustomed) really is. The moment does not pass without some poignancy, though. Looking after the Bachelor as it passes, Ahab ponderously pulls a vial of Nantucket sand from his pocket, possibly thinking of the mirth of home, or of being homeward bound. We the readers get a small glimpse and reminder of Ahab the sentimentalist.

Chapter 115: The Pequod meets the Bachelor

Hooray!

Well, we’re on our way;
Homeward! Cheer us on our victory day.

We’re on our way;
Set the honest work aside for honest play.

Hooray!

Every cask is full, and then some –
The hold is overflowing!

Hard times for you?
We’re sorry, we spoke not even knowing!

Hooray!

Thou art too damned jolly.
Head thee home if home is calling.
Get thee on your way –
That’s all I really have to say.
Get thee on your way,
Hey, hey, hey.

Hooray!

When we’re flush, we’re flush –
Hop aboard, we’ll treat you to a party.

White whale what?
Lighten up, you think you’re such a smarty.

Well, we’re on our way;
Homeward! Cheer us on our victory day.
(Thou art too damned jolly.)

Well, we’re on our way;
Homeward! Cheer us on our victory day.
(Get thee home if home is calling.)

Hooray!

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 18, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 23, 2011

In a routine pumping of the hold, Starbuck discovers a good amount of oil mixed in with the pumped sea water, implying a significant leak in the casks. Unfortunately, Ahab is nearing the fishing grounds around Japan, and so nearing his fated encounter with Moby Dick, which leads him to refuse a pause in the voyage to repair the casks and save the oil.

Starbuck, of course, objects, and in the ensuing argument we see yet another recognition by Ahab of his own failing mental health. After Starbuck takes his leave of the cabin, Ahab paces awhile, then changes his mind in the matter, ascending to the deck to give orders for the crew to tend the leaky casks. Ahab’s motives remain a mystery as the chapter ends, but Ishmael offers two possibilities. For one, simply, “It may have been a flash of honesty in him.” Perhaps more likely, though, Ahab doesn’t want to seem crazy or otherwise unfit for duty, because that might lead to a justified mutiny, and so end his quest. In other words, Ahab is sane enough to foster his insanity in secrecy.

Chapter 109: Ahab and Starbuck in the Cabin

Leaky casks
In the Autumn of my voyage,
Never checked.
Leaky casks
In the hold of leaky vessel,
On and on.

Leaky casks
Lose in double-time what’s gathered
Tooth and nail,
And the ordinary thoughts we carry sink
In the sea.

When the sea fills the vacuum left behind,
Then the mind begins to weigh
And the spirit loses buoyancy.

Leaky casks,
Never thought I’d stop to fix them,
By and by,
But convincing me, my enemies are kind
Yet to me.

When the sea fills the vacuum left behind,
Then the mind begins to weigh
And the spirit loses buoyancy.

Leaky casks
In the Autumn of my voyage,
Never checked.
And the ordinary thoughts we carry sink
In the sea.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 17, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 21, 2011

Says Ishmael, the whale’s skull composes the barest fraction of the mass of its head, implying a deficient intelligence in the phrenological view. Furthermore, depressions at the top of the skull would imply a lack of self-esteem and veneration. We know the whale to be opposite from these conclusions, though. Some sailors hold that the seat of intelligence in the whale lies in the sperm magazine rather than the brain, coming much closer to describing the whale’s character by lending a mystic quality to the whale’s sentience.

However, the best answer for Ishmael lies in the backbone — what better metaphor for the whale’s character than the firm and indomitable spine it is known to possess? Furthermore the magnitude of each vertebrae, especially nearer the skull itself, summatively compensates in mass for the diminutive skull itself. Therefore, according to Ishmael, the field of phrenology must expand its examinations of character to account for the spine as well as the skull, or it will continue to prove an inadequate science.

Chapter 80: The Nut

The phrenologist says, “You’re gonna have to wait for a while –
The skull of this whale is buried twenty feet from its smile.”

And I say, “Woe to the sailor; cheers to a stunning conceit –
So human is the notion that the head is the spiritual seat.”

And you say, “Maybe in a monster renowned more for power than guile
The ghost in the machine lives in the high Roman forehead with style.”

And I say, “With every minute, the character that’s in it must rest
Upon a mighty flagpole — the backbone’s the answer to test.”

Its vertebrae, close to the spigot
Equal the source in size, to the digit –
There resides a will, inflexible by its very design.

The phrenologist says, “You’re gonna have to wait for a while –
The skull of this whale is buried twenty feet from its smile.”

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 13, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 12, 2011

All this starts with networking my listeners in a way that allows me to contact you all for shows and events. I know from looking at my blog stats every week that there are a lot of you. If you haven’t done so already, please take a minute right now to like me on Facebook, and you will hear from me in the coming weeks and months. And please pass it on to your friends, or anyone you might think would be interested.

I’m looking forward to seeing the turnout!

In “The Monkey-rope,” Ishmael finds himself in a uniquely perilous variation of this practice. On the Pequod, Stubb demands that the monkey-rope be tied to the crew-mate on deck as well as the harpooneer overboard. In this case, Ishmael tends to Queequeg, knowing that “should poor Queequeg sink to rise no more, then both usage and honor demanded, that instead of cutting the cord, it should drag me down in his wake.” In short, Stubb increases the security of the harpooneer by marrying his fate to the fate of the party responsible for him. The practice encourages (requires) the attendant crew-mate to do the moral and just thing by removing his ability to do otherwise.

Interestingly, at the end of the chapter, Stubb revolts against a similar move pulled by Aunt Charity — Bildad’s sister, who provisioned the Pequod before its voyage. Encouraging (requiring) temperance by removing access to alcohol, Charity deems to make a moral crew. When Queequeg returns to the deck after a long and hard labor, shivering with the cold of the sea, the steward brings him a warm ginger tea, as provisioned for the task by Charity. Sensing “some sneaking Temperance Society movement about this business,” Stubb overrides Charity’s restrictions by fetching the alcohol himself.

“The Monkey-rope” raises interesting questions of law and custom. Societies perhaps need laws and restrictions to set an accountably moral tone, but at what point do laws actually inhibit man’s moral development by inhibiting his choice? Can an act be moral if the actor has no choice to do otherwise?

Chapter 72: The Monkey-rope

Cannibals, cutting spades, sharks snapping free,
All tossed in the sea
With Queequeg and me.

Great consternation aloft and between,
Begun at the scene
And taken to mean

That islands exist only in our dreams,
Not reality,
And Fate can’t prevent a slip.

Think it insurance, the danger is spread
To many a head,
And thus was I wed.

A monkey-rope fashioned and tied to my belt,
And tied to his belt,
Security felt

By none and by all simultaneously,
Bonded famously.
We feel one another’s slips.

Stubb instituted this perilous plot
To rally our lot,
Though moral or not,

Just as Aunt Charity’s temperance would do,
Encouraging through
Restrictive milieu.

But false institutions never lent
To our betterment.
We’re tied by the bonds of men
To defend
The one at the risk of ten.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 12, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea July 5, 2011

Ishmael’s characterization of the shark as completely inhuman seems strange, as it almost immediately follows a chapter comparing Stubb’s racist acts towards the cook to the behavior of sharks. Does Ishmael perhaps feel that some men in this world have given up their humanity for power (power of rank, power of the mob)? Or does Ishmael lead us to imagine that in every human soul lies an ongoing battle between the whale and the shark, which untended will leave us stripped of our humanity at the hands of our own neglect?

Chapter 66: The Shark Massacre

‘Round and ’round neither up nor down,
The teeth of sharks till a fertile ground.
An empty eye, a cold machine
Bites in reflexivity.

A giant whale, a mass deceived,
After sharks visit for a meal,
And strip each bone, and leave no meat,
Quite a thorough industry.

And even cut, a shark will eat
The entrails out of its own defeat,
And once consumed, the entrails leak
Back out of its misery.

Beware, young man, for death misleads,
A soulless shark still pursues its greed.
It snaps its jaws when thus subdued,
Pain fulfills it more than food.

(c) and (p) 2010 Patrick Shea
Words and music written by Patrick Shea August 10, 2010
All parts performed, arranged, and recorded by Patrick Shea May 29, 2011