Reading #6 0uOAe5e85yM THE FIRST LOWERING hsJrODVEEsY TRAILER.

Reading #6https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uOAe5e85yMTHE FIRST LOWERING

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsJrODVEEsYTRAILER

Reading #6 Overview

• Whiteness• Ahab – Support vs Mutiny• Sword Mat - - Fate• There she blows! First lowering• Ahab and dusky phantoms – EVIL

imagery

The Whiteness of the Whale

• “It was the whiteness of the whale that above all things appalled me” (181).

• “an elusive something in the innermost idea of this hue that strikes more panic of the soul than redness which affrights in blood” (182).

• “And of all of these things, the albino whale was the symbol. Wonder ye then at the fiery hunt” (189)?

• 181 – Whiteness (beauty and purity)

BUT…• 182 – White Polar Bear• 183 - White Horse• 184 – Albino Man• 185 – White Squall• 189 – WHITE WHALE!!!!

ALL QUOTES FROM CH. 42 in case you have different page numbers

The concept of Moby Dick as a symbol will emerge as we move through the text. The whale itself will mean different things to different people, as in the

nature of the color white.

Reading #6 – Recap• CHAPTER 46 – 2nd Paragraph

Starbuck's body and Starbuck's coerced will were Ahab's, so long as Ahab kept his magnet at Starbuck's brain; still he knew that for all this the chief mate, in his soul, abhorred his captain's quest, and could he, would joyfully disintegrate himself from it, or even frustrate it.

Consider this developing foil between Ahab and Starbuck. With what internal feelings and thoughts will Starbuck struggle?

Also, read the first sentence of chapter 46; paraphrase what this tells us about Ahab’s mindset and his role as captain of The Pequod.

Chapter 46 - -Surmises

• “They may scorn cash now, but let some months go by, and no prospective promise of it to them…this same cash would soon cashier Ahab” (205).

What does Ahab “surmise” in this chapter?

(Paraphrase his thoughts).

The Mat-Maker – Ch. 47

“It was a cloudy, sultry afternoon; the seamen were lazily lounging about the decks, or vacantly gazing over the

leaden colored waters” (206).

“it seemed as if this were the Loom of Time, and I myself were a shuttle mechanically weaving and weaving away at the Fates…free will still free to play her shuttle between given threads” (207). –

Ch. 47

What are the thematic implications of this scene?

“There she blows! There she blows!”

• “With a start, all glared at dark Ahab, who was surrounded by five dusky

phantoms that seemed fresh formed out of the air” (209) – Last line of Ch.

47.

“The First Lowering”

Evil and Darkness Analysis•“dark Ahab”

•“dusky phantoms”

•“I silently recalled the mysterious shadows I had seen creeping on board the Pequod” (212).•“Fedallah had thrown aside his black jacket…while on the other end of the boat…Ahab was seen steadily managing his steering oar” (213).

• Final two pages of Ch.48 (218-219)

DangerDetail

Imagery

Chapter 48 (217)• “Not the raw recruit, marching from the

bosom of his wife into the fever heat of his first battle; not the dead man's ghost encountering the first unknown phantom in the other world; - neither of these can feel stranger and stronger emotions than that man does, who for the first time finds himself pulling into the charmed, churned circle of the hunted Sperm Whale.”

In this passage, Ishmael romanticizes the experience of whaling. Is there something in your own life about which you feel similar emotion?

Recreate this passage, in your own creative terms, connecting things for you have strong emotion.

Human Interdependence

• Flask and Daggoo

Pg. 214 – (Chapter 48): “with one dexterous fling, landed the little man high and dry on his shoulders.”

“On his broad back…Flask seemed a snowflake.” (humor and imagery)

Explain the thematic connection: