The sun hits the back of the trees and shadows begin to creep up my feet. A good half hour has passed. I am bored, cooling down, and obviously uncomfortable with my partially naked solo act on the lawn. I begin to pack up. I slip on my shorts and fold up the blanket when I spot a man across the lawn eying me. I am uncomfortable, sure, but I would be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued. I can't help but look back.

He gets up and dusts off his pants. I get nervous. I quickly put my tank top on and pack my books into my bag. The man makes his way through the crowds of hard-bodied NYU students in their triangle-bikinis and stops at my spot.

"Hi," he says, and I flush. Thankfully, I have now reached fully-clothed-ness. "I know this is weird, but would you like to join me for a glass of wine?"

Two thoughts enter my mind: The first is how awkward this situation is, and how weird it would be to accept. The second is the hilarious story that will emerge from saying yes. I inevitably choose the later, of course.

I walk with him about twenty yards away to his make-shift picnic and he pours me a plastic wine glass of chilled white. I taste it, expensive, and look at his accoutrements: a worn copy of Moby Dick and a bound court case. Exciting.

"Listen, I know this is weird, but you live in Stuyvesant Town, right?" he asks.

"Yes. I mean, I have been lying out...." I say, and swallow a heavy gulp of wine.

"Right. Well," he pauses. He looks nervous, and his wine-cup may or may not be shaking in his hand. It is hard to tell in the waning light. "Well. I saw you walking yesterday."

I frown. "You saw me?"

"I saw you. Yesterday. It rained all morning, and then it cleared up and the sun came out. You were walking in on 14th and A and I was behind you, and there was a puddle --"

"There was a puddle?"

"Yes, a large one. Do you remember?"

I nod. I think there was a puddle, and I had definitely emerged from the L around 5ish when the skies has cleared.

He rubs his forehead and smiles. "So you were in front of me, and there was a big puddle, and you -- I know this is weird, but you stepped, you leapt over the puddle, and it was so beautiful, you, you were so beautiful . . . and then I saw you on the lawn right now. And I decided if I didn't ask you to come have a drink with me I would hate myself for the next month."

"You would?" At this point, I begin to chug the delicious glass of wine like a tall boy of Coors.

"Yes. See, my brother was supposed to be here, but he got busy."

I see. I see how very quickly a 33 year old Jewish lawyer with a copy of Moby Dick can turn into a creepy man with a crush on a 24 year old girl in a rush to get home from Brooklyn. And when he asks for my number I say no, and sweetly provide my email address.

Coming soon: New chapters from "Insightful Emails from Rejected Suiters: The Lawyer Edition".

Teleporter – Come on folks.  Really?  I can see my house from space on my computer and we can’t teleport a burrito to my sofa?  Ridiculous.

Pillow cooler - Some sort of device that keeps your pillow cool so you don’t have to flip it over in the middle of the night.  There is nothing better than putting your face on a cold pillow.  The only way I can describe it is by making up a word, “facegasm”.  Yep.

The only downside from this invention is that many sports analysts will be losing a catchphrase.  Instead of saying, “And Garnett is cooler than the other side of the pillow”, they’ll have to say, “And Garnett is as cool as the original side of the pillow he initially laid his head upon which is as cool as it was when he first started sleeping due to recent advances in technology.  Booyah!”  It doesn’t have the same ring to it.

Hoverboards – I know that there is a hoverboard, but perhaps not many.  I saw it in Back to the Future.  It is around here somewhere.  I want to be able to evade local bullies and cause general ballyhoo with my hoverboard.  I also feel like it would be much easier than skateboarding. 

More dentists­ – This isn’t as much of an invention as it is something that bothers me.  Every time I had dentist appointment growing up it was probably the only thing on the calendar that was not subject to change.  I think my mother would have rather moved Christmas than try to cancel my dentist appointment.  As if there are legions and legions of people waiting for your thirty minute spot once you forfeit it.  Is there that much of a shortage of dentists in the world?  Is it because we fucking hate all of you and your hygienists because you spend thirty minutes carving up my mouth and then remark that my gums are bleeding because I’m “not flossing enough”?  Really?  I’m convinced now that flossing is not the issue of whether or not my gums bleed.  I’m pretty sure the issue is that you’re taking a harpoon to my mouth like you’re hunting Moby Dick.  That is the issue.  You went to school for this and you’re hacking away like you’re cutting a flank steak.  I can get that same skill set at the butcher.

Giant mechanized robots that could be used in war situations – I think in general that war with humans has become terribly impersonal.  Countries just dropping bombs on each other make it so people don’t understand the true toll that war takes.  But I understand that with greater technology we have acquired the means to wage war without losing lives on our side.  Now I understand the logic, but I fee like if we’re going to be waging war, we want to be really bad ass about it.  I think by now there should have been giant mechanized robots that people could get into and control and then fight that way.  It would be like those robots in the third Matrix movie, but it would be much cooler… and they could fly.  I’m just saying, you think someone at D.O.D. would have at least submitted a proposal.  Scientists are spending time cloning sheep and making iPods that test your blood sugar but we don’t have a giant robot army at our disposal.  You know that the Japanese and Chinese are working right now on making a robot army and their robots are much more fuel efficient than ours.

Light sabers – Now I don’t want to get too crazy, but what if we made light sabers for our robot army to fight with? Chills. 

Ice that doesn’t melt – I know this seems a little ridiculous but hear me out.  Isn’t it the worst when it’s a really hot day or you’re on vacation and you’re drinking your fruity drink with an umbrella in it and you don’t want to be too much of a college student and finish your drink like it’s got some sort of youth elixir in it.  Plus you will also get brain freeze.  The face that people make when they have brain freeze can only be described as a confused concern.  It almost looks like someone is pooping something they shouldn’t be, like a television remote.

But in any case you have your beverage in your hand and then it starts melting at an exponential rate.  Before you know it you have half a cup filled with a watered down drink called something like Island Fruit Genocide (with rum).

Or another example, let’s say it is the middle of July and you decide it’s time for an ice cream cone on a Saturday afternoon.  You realize this is a bold move due to the melting factor.  You think you can eat the ice cream faster that it can melt, but you are always wrong.  That ice cream cone requires more attention than a classroom of first graders at a whoopee cushion factory.  I mean there is constant vigilance and then there is melting ice cream cone vigilance.  How nice would it be to avoid that hassle?

So, let’s see what we can do on the non-melting ice front, scientists.  Yeah I’m talking to you.

Alarm clocks that sound like our mothers – I don’t know if I’m alone on this one, but I would much rather be woken up by mom saying, “Honey, time to wake up” than the sound, as far as I can tell, of Chernobyl melting.  The abrupt nature of the sound, which has been known to shrink human sphincters by 67% upon reaching the limbic system, has been the bane of sleepy individuals since its invention.  All I’m saying is that we could get some sort of recording device to put on our alarm clocks, have your mother speak into the recording apparatus and have that be your alarm, and not the sound of the Star Trek Enterprise going to warp factor seven. 

Now I realize that my experience of being woken up by my mother might be an experience of being an only child, but someone has been woken up by their mothers at some point and you know it is far superior than anything else.

Time machines – I’m not advocating the use of the time machine to necessarily be able to screw around with the fabric of space and time itself, but I think we would have been able to at least invent one by now.  Just because I want the ability to crush a man’s skull in my head doesn’t mean I’m going to actually do it.  It’s just nice to know it’s possible.

I would like to thank Evan and Mar for their contributions

So for those of you who read this and have your own ideas for things we should have invented by now, please submit them in the form of comments at the end of this post.  I would love to hear your feedback.  This is only Part I and if I dig your comments (if any of you have them), your inventions will be in Part II which will hopefully be at the end of this week or sometime early next week.

-

"Puritanic sands..."  That is his description of US soil.

I also liked the phrase, "Adam, who died 60 round centuries ago..." i'm not sure why I liked it, except that it made me think of how much things have changed.  I don't think Darwin had made his splash yet.   Education, academia, maybe thinking in general seems so complicated now.  There are more dimensions.  I know this earth's age thing gets people's underwear all wadded up, or however the phrase goes, and it's a great dividing line for lots of folks.  I have heard talk of the good old days when education and religion were one (though I don't see how that would be good but that is just me. And a ton of other people).  As I stated before, I don't like talking about earth origin stuff because it's not really concrete--there are other more certain subjects to tackle, I think.  But I can't help wondering what it would be like to study and write at a time when such things were taken for granted; when people didn't spend time talking about it as much (or did they?), or divide much over it.  I think I prefer to write in a  time of many viewpoints and I like the complexity of the conflicting views, but still, I wonder.

-

"Methinks what they call my shadow on earth is my true substance."  This whole paragraph was pretty astounding, I thought.  But that's the one that stuck out to me.

-

"The world's a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; and the pulpit is it's prow."

I love this entire chapter--the descriptions of the church as if it's a ship (that quote was just a summary.)  It reminds me of the diversity within the Kingdom of God.  I'm not a purpose driven Christian.  I'm very comfortable with being a writer and I don't really think God would care if I changed my mind and decided to become a genetic engineer, butt I do think God is involved in whatever I chose.   I think of when Jesus told Peter he'd make him a fisher of men.  People laugh at that verse a lot but whatever.  I love the fact that Jesus is so involved in his disciples fishing, throughout the gospels.  Think:How did Jesus find his tax money?  Anyway, as a writer, I am really hung up on this idea of being a part of God's story for humanity, the poetry God wrote into his creation (from marriage to self-resurrecting forests with seeds that only start to work when they touch a flame), and especially this idea Paul came up with that God is the "author and perfecter of our faith."  There is something to learn about God from all areas of life.  That's why I just loved that in this chapter, Melville seemed to be seeking within the boundaries of his obsession.

-

I think this book is making me interested in boats.

-

Oh, and speaking of choices, I saw a bumper sticker last week that read "God is pro LIFE." I agree, Jesus is life, after all.  But I couldn't help but notice that someone could have a bumper sticker that said "God let's us choose," and they would also be correct.

Dedico as fotos desta noite a Srta. Karoline, a mais bela mulher que estava presente no Moby esta noite.

Vejam as fotos em slide show ou no álbum de fotos.

Deixem seus recados aqui!

"Because no man can ever feel his own identity aright except his eyes be closed; as if darkness were indeed the proper element of our essences, though light be more congenial to our clayey part."

-From Moby-Dick, page 45

Primeiro dia de agosto, último final de semana antes das férias acabarem...

Quem tem ido no Moby nas últimas sextas sabe que é verdade o que vou falar agora: "as noites de sexta no Moby estão cada vez melhores".

O DJ Carioca tá mandando super bem no som, ontem, então, ele parecia inspirado...

A Banda Carlos Bronson, todos já sabem, quando soube ao palco arrebenta...

O Chiquinho e o Boy da Friends EVentos também tem muita culpa no sucesso das noites de sextas, o trabalho de promoção dessa dupla é excelente.

E belas mulheres desfilam pela casa como se estivessem na passarela... ai já viu... sexta no Moby é Balada de PRIMEIRISSÍMO NÍVEL.

Vejam as fotos dessa sexta em slide show ou no álbum de fotos.

Deixem seus recados aqui.

PS: Pessoal, sempre lembrando, para a turma que me vê sempre super-sério na balada, é que o agito da noite não é muito minha praia, mas adoro fazer fotos e gosto muito de receber o carinho de todos vcs, apesar de as vezes parecer que estou com cara de quem comeu e não gostou. :-)

Captain Ahab and his chief mate Starbuck sailed the seas to capture this great white whale. But as fate would have it, when the harpoon struck, the rope flew out entangling Ahab, pulling him under.

This classic was written by Herman Melville, born AUGUST 1, 1819.

Grandson of a Boston Tea Party Indian, Melville's father died when he was 12. Raised by a mother who inspired his imagination with biblical stories, Herman Melville shipped out as a cabin boy on a whaling ship and later sailed the South Seas with the Navy.

He fell among Typee cannibals in the Marquesas Islands. Rescued, he wrote in an account:

"These disclosures will...lead to...ultimate benefit to the cause of Christianity in the Sandwich Islands."

In his classic novel, Moby Dick, Herman Melville wrote:

"With this sin of disobedience...Jonah flouts at God...He thinks that a ship made by men will carry him into countries where God does not reign."

In 1983, The U.S. District Court stated in Crockett v. Sorenson:

"Better known works which rely on allusions from the Bible include Milton's Paradise Lost...Shakespeare...and Melville's Moby Dick...Secular education...demands that the student have a good knowledge of the Bible."

Stiff Right Jab, contributing editor, William J. Federer, is the bestselling author of “Backfired: A Nation Born for Religious Tolerance no Longer Tolerates Religion,” and numerous other books. A frequent radio and television guest, his daily American Minute is broadcast nationally via radio, television, and Internet. Check out all of Bill's books here.

Spread the Word!

Stämmer gamle Howies teori kanske all amerikanism sedan 1849 på något sätt är en omedveten strävan bort från sammankopplingen med den mytomspunne författaren och poeten, bort från dennes mörka värld. Landet och dess ledare vill distansiera sig från spöken, röda dödar och andra amsagor. De motarbetar aktivt Poe och de motarbetar aktivt de otäckheter han skapade genom att flytta bort alla mörkermän och spöken till andra länder och stater, på lagom missilavstånd.

Slående är annars vilken roman som brukar kallas för USA:s nationalepos: valfångardramat Moby Dick. En groteskt tjock lunta om en tjurskalle till sjöbuss som bara är ute efter tre saker: hämnd, död och lite (lamp)olja.

I took my 10-year-old Little Man (LM10) out for a date last weekend, just the two of us.  We ate dinner at the Rainforest Cafe (his choice), then headed over to Barnes & Noble so he could spend a gift card that had been burning a hole in his pockets since his birthday.

After carefully making his selections, making sure he stayed close to the amount of the gift card, we made our way to the front of the store.  Ah, the front of the store, where all the cool little extras are displayed ...

I pointed out an umbrella on display; available in hunter green or black, it features quotes from various well-known books.  LM10 took one look at it and said "Call me Ishmael, that's from Moby Dick!"  Well, you could have knocked me down with a feather, as the saying goes.  He's TEN, how does he know that line?!?  It turns out, he's reading a series of books by Rick Riordan, and the volume he just finished, The Sea of Monsters, mentions Moby Dick, Herman Melville, and that famous opening line.  Apparently LM10 retains what he reads!

So, hats off to Rick Riordan for including that literary reference in his novel.  And, yes, we bought the umbrella!  Have you made any non-book impulse purchases at a bookstore lately?

Poderoso.

Aveva già accennato a questo principio dicendo, appena all'inizio del medesimo capitolo: "ogni cosa umana che si proponga di essere completa, proprio per questo, deve sicuramente avere dei difetti."

Io ho pensato subito al mio lavoro, alla ricerca iniziata molti anni fa, per cui ho provveduto negli ultimi anni a reperire gli strumenti necessari. Da tre anni a questa parte ho raccolto i materiali necessari e, dall'inizio di questo anno, ho iniziato a dare una struttura, ho provato a stendere alcune parti, ma una versione definitiva sembra ancora un lontano miraggio... Quanti anni!

Così non posso fare a meno di andare a cercare notizie sulla cattedrale di Colonia, su Wikipedia: "L'odierna cattedrale venne costruita per ospitare le reliquie dei Re Magi, portate da Milano dall'imperatore Federico Barbarossa e consegnate all'Arcivescovo di Colonia Rainald von Dassel nel 1164. La prima pietra venne posata il 15 agosto 1248 dall'Arcivescovo Konrad von Hochstaden. Nel 1322 venne consacrato il coro della chiesa, ma dopo questi progressi relativamente rapidi i lavori andarono incontro ad un progressivo rallentamento, fino a fermarsi: nel 1560 non si era costruito che lo scheletro principale della struttura."

Chissà se è proprio così, se ogni grande opera deve mettere in conto di rimanere incompiuta... O, perlomeno, di non poter essere compiuta solamente da un Uomo.

Mi pare che anche la Sagrada Familia a Barcellona abbia fatto la stessa fine...

Allow me to explain. One of my recreational activities in the field is to reread books I read in high school. I read Frankenstein and Heart of Darkness on the flights to Ethiopia, but the bulk of my downtime the first few weeks here has been spent reading Melville's classic Moby-Dick. Inspired by the epic, I decided to name a group of bachelors after the main characters. This was the first group I named-- Ahab, Ishmael, Queequeg, and Moby-Dick. However, their association was fleeting. Ishmael now hangs out with several subadult males. Ahab and Moby Dick disappeared for two weeks, only to resurface with a new group of bachelors. Queequeg has become a loner, foraging far away from the main band. While the other bachelor groups remain fairly stable (occasionally associating with a random subadult male), this group seems to have split. Did I overestimate their sociality in the beginning? If I want to keep my theme-named groups, I’ll have to name more bachelors after Moby-Dick characters. Starbuck sounds like a good gelada name.

"If he had not been a small degree civilized, he very well probably would not have troubled himself with boots at all; but then, if he had not been still a savage, he never would have dreampt of getting under the bed to put them on."

In another time, or maybe to another person in this time, this scene would have probably been a riot. Hilarious, I mean. I can sense how it's funny, but there is too much in my PC mind barricading my ability to find much humor the jokes about being uncivilized. I think this is progress; it's sort of degrading humor that has been washed out by awareness of other cultures and things. I guess people probably do still argue that Western culture is "further along," but I can't see it that way. Especially not American culture. There is so much that we do that seems ridiculous compared to the way other people do it; eating, for one. It's ridiculous what we feed ourselves in this country, and that food that isn't pumped with crazy chemicals is more expensive than the stuff that's healthy. Health care for another--it's very odd to think that people are turned away for health care sometimes here. Food and health just seem like basic concepts; ones we haven't quite mastered.

And the very idea of laughing at someone's differences just doesn't register to me. In this case, the habit of wearing boots. When I was in Pietermaritzburg, I observed a rehearsal of a play performed by Zulus, Americans, and British people. There was a scene when a Zulu man was fascinated by a pair of boots and it offended some of the cast members. "Do they think we have never heard of shoes? We wear shoes!" one of them said. What is it about boots as being a source for this humor? Why is someone out of it if they don't wear boots? In most parts of the world, maybe not most but many, it's too hot for them.

The type of humor reminds me of all the stuff Disney used to get away with but can't anymore. Even the fact that Queequeg is (suspected of?) being a cannibal--and noticing the red steak meat he eats for breakfast-- would just never fly anymore, just like it doesn't fly to have an Uncle Remus character in "Song of the South." Some people see it as innocence, but, like Melville stated in the last chapter, the ignorance is the parent of fear. I can see how it goes hand in hand. Sometimes I still hear this sort of joke passed along, this sort of making fun of a person's lack of touch with Western Culture, and it always makes me stop. I wonder if the person who cracked the joke has been tucked away in a block of ice for the last five decades.

Not to say that I'm not enjoying the book, or that I'm offended, or that my reaction to this aspect of it is preventing me from getting anything else out of it. It would be foolish to get offended, knowing the context of when the book was written. It's very odd to think that Melville's humor about being uncivilized is, itself, a lack of cultural progression...

A meme that has been floating around the past week was recently asked at this year's 'Way With Words Festival'.

Some contemporary writers were recently asked, "Which classic are you ashamed to say that you've never read?"

So I figured this is a great place to start up a similar discussion, feel free to post your own response to this question.

I could list many books into this category, but the one that I most feel guilty about not having read is Herman Melville's "Moby Dick". It's sitting on my shelf in a nice compact Bantam edition, yet for some reason I never manage to read the novel. I'm aware of its status as one of the defining novels in all of American Literature. Oh, I can fake it with the best of them.... "No, I disagree, Moby Dick is not so much about an epic battle between good and evil, but more of a commentary on English Imperialism in New England, I mean, Ahab's tossing of his pipe, a casting off of the shackles of dependence on foreign sources of economy....clearly!"

So I must pass on the question to you, my avid reader. What's your personal shame, what classic work of literature have you ignored?

In that way, books are like ghosts, if they continue to be read by people.  They are forever adding to the discussion, even if it seems that particular discussion has ended.  It's sort of eerie.

--

I was pretty amused when I read that Ishmael "abominated the thought of sleeping with" the harpooneer.  It's nice to see an author having fun.

Did innkeepers (or in this case, landlords) really rent out rooms to more than one person?  Strangers?  I found it to be a bit hard to believe.

--

"Ignorance is the parent of fear."

That is so true.  I wonder if that is/was a common proverb. I've never heard it stated like that before but I totally agree.  Maybe that is part of Ishmael's thing.  He knows a bit about the world already and maybe he's trying to fight being prejudiced or drawing conclusions about people.  It seemed he was in this chapter.   The stumbling into the Negro church really boggled me in the last chapter, though.

And speaking of drawing conclusions about people, I feel like traveling has both made me see how individual each person is while simultaneously wanting to group people together and say, "That's a western thing," or a Thai or Indian thing.  I found myself fighting the idea of coming off too American, yet frequently telling people that the US is a melting pot.  No two people are the same but it seems like it's easier to draw conclusions about them based on where they are from.  Or to try to recognize the patterns, even though I know full well there are always and usually exceptions.

Anyway, I'm very curious to find out what Melville will do with this Queequeg character.

I wonder that too, about the homeless people who choose to hang around New York, my Detroit, or, heaven forbid, Chicago (which I am nearly convinced is the coldest place on earth in the winter.)  It's true, there are tons more  Lazaruses in California.  One of my favorite people in the world has a scheme to make "homeless people trading cards" for the famous homeless people of LA.  It never occurred to me, but LA is a place where everyone feels the need to make a splash and remembered, which is probably my friend deems the homeless people worthy of trading card covers.

It's funny to me that Jesus had a friend named Lazarus (who he raised from the dead) and then told this story about a guy getting his sores licked after he dies in poverty and giving the character the same name.  As my uncle pointed out yesterday, Lazarus means "God is our hope," so I guess it's not rocket science that Jesus chose that name, but... you know.

My boyfriend says if he were homeless he'd just start walking south.

"Would not Lazarus rather be in Sumatra than here?"

Um, who doesn't want to be in Sumatra?

--

What's the difference between "jolly" and "cheery," and why is it more acceptable to be cheery than jolly?

Lisa pointed out that his name might not be Ishmael. Call me Ishmael leaves room for that idea. I will be paying close attention to see if any of the other characters in the book refer to him by that name. I'm guessing they won't. Rob, on the other hand, saw it as an intimate invitation and seemed to take it for granted that Ishmael is the narrator's real name. Thinking about it on my own, and in context with the rest of the chapter, I see it as having a few different connotations. Most of us know that Ishmael was Sarah's mistake, a source of division and sorrow, and, as the story goes (from t, the start of the Palestinian/Israel conflict. So the name Ishmael runs pretty deep. I wonder how much Melville knew about the conflict at the time. I mean, this is pre-WWII.

When I think of the character in the Abraham story, I think of Ishmael being maybe the most tragic figure in the whole book of Genesis--maybe the whole Bible. He's exiled from his family, and yes, God blesses him, but you know... it's not the same. I mean, when you're a kid, how comforting is it to know that you must flee the only home you know, even if you get the promise of having gobs of descendants? That's why I sort of read Call me Ishmael with the idea that he's crying out, "Woe to me!" Or maybe he's just setting up the further discussion of his condition of not being able to stay on land for very long. He's saying, I'm an awkward fellow (he likes watery places), but then sort of describes that all (men, hmph) share this awkwardness of longing to be at sea. That's how I took it anyway.

I know for a fact that all people don't have adventurer streaks, but alas, call me Ishmael, I have that disease. I want to see what's out there. And sometimes my travel disease does make me feel a bit like a mistake. I mean, it would be much easier on my family (and my back, from moving so much stuff around to storage) if I had the ability to stay in one place for longer than, say, two years at a time. But I get that drizzly November feeling too. And I love this stuff about not wanting to be a passenger. I sort of reflect that attitude, too, I think; when I go places, I never want to be a tourist. I want to have a duty. To belong the best I can (though, call me Ishmael, I don't really get to belong to these places where I am a stranger. Not fully.)

Maybe I share with him the looming need to be in a place where I don't really belong. I sort of thrive in, or am most comfortable in places where I don't fully blend in. This can sometimes be a burden, but it makes me feel alive; when I put on shoes that don't really fit, I never forget I am wearing those shoes.

A simple sailor--yes, that sort of describes my experience in Thailand. I wasn't there to reach some ambition (to be a sea captain) and I wasn't there as a tourist (or passenger who has to worry about how to spend money), but rather, a simple sailor earning my experience by simple ( okay it was wacky--it was really wacky work) labor. And I want to see more places but I don't want to just pass through. I want to be a part of those places. To have purpose, which is different than ambition. Maybe just to "be friendly with all the inmates of the place" I'm lodging in.

--

higgledy-piggledy: they just don't use words like that any more.

--

Writers hear two different bits of wisdom when trying to decide what they will write about.  1) Write what you know.  2) Write what interests you.  The second makes a lot more sense, though I can see why people would be discouraged from writing about kinds of people and places they are unfamiliar with.  But would anyone really try to do that?  But maybe "know" is sort of a loose term anyway.  Do writers need to be told these things?  One bit of advice I liked was from Natalie Goldberg.  She said "Write about that topic you just can't stop talking about."   It sounds practical.

--

Melville, with these extracts, or quotes about whales, seems to be shouting something.  Something like:

THIS IS GONNA BE A BOOK ABOUT WHALES!

or

I AM OBSESSED WITH WHALES AND THAT IS WHY I HAVE WRITTEN A MASTERPIECE ABOUT ONE!

or

GET READY FOR WHALES, FOLKS!

or

HERE'S A CRASH COURSE IN CETOLOGY

and then

NOW LISTEN TO WHAT I HAVE TO CONTRIBUTE!

--

The quotes about the oil in whales jumped out at me (of course they did).  It's just so bizarre to think, especially in light of our current world, there is an animal out there, swimming in the ocean, holding within it a "sea of oil."

What?

--

Natalie Goldberg also suggests a writing exercise where the writer picks a word like death, teeth, or sleep, and writes about it non stop for 10 or 20 minutes or so.  "Write everything you know about...  Now go!"

--

WRITING EXERCISE: Everything I know about WHALES:

P'Nui told me that she and P'Gwang went on a whale sightseeing trip while she was near Cape Cod.  She saw the tail in the distance. That's all she saw.  One of the extracts mentioned that when a whale snaps his tail, the sound can be heard from three or four miles away.  Whales are outrageous. They hold oil? They sing?  They are giants.

I barely ever think of whales, or think of the fact that one of my best friends has seen a tail of one; sat in the ocean with one.  Maybe my aunt saw some in Alaska, I don't know.  At the moment, seeing a whale seems like it would be the same as going to the moon--something I assumed when I was young that everyone got to do before they died.  A natural part of life, or something.  But now, seeing a live whale in the ocean seems like  something only select people experience.  Though, of course, I'm much more likely to see a whale than I am the moon.

Whales have songs they sing to each other and they travel in groups from the north to the south and then the north again, along the American coast.  Huge distances.  Whenever I think of Jonah I also think of Geppetto and Pinnochio, because they both hung out in whales for a while.  I never read the book of Jonah.  There's a ton in the old testament that I've never read.  My friend read it and she related to Jonah, thinking that she was being disobedient to her call because she didn't feel like meeting the responsibilities of her job.  I think her reaction made me not want to read Jonah--it seemed like it was a story about disobedience and punishment, and that's not a story I necessarily want to read.

Whales change their song every year.  I think I learned this on PBS.  Or maybe I made it up.  I don't know.

Whales are really heavy.  When sperm whales end up sick and on the beach, it's an event to get them back in the ocean.  It takes a Whale Rider to get them back.

I think some whales have hammerheads. No, wait, that's sharks.

Killer Whales, like Willy, are not killers.  They are usually portrayed as heroes or maybe it's victims.  I don't know.  I never saw the movie.  Killer whales are smaller than sperm whales.

Whale hunting may or may not be illegal now.  Lot's of people are into "Saving the whales."  That is interesting, because some of the extracts made it seem like whales were viewed as dragons or monsters of the sea.  Scary as hell.  Of course they would be scary.  If I went with the P's on their whale "hunt," would I be sort of scared?   Humans are powerful creatures.  You know they are powerful when it's up to them to save monsters.

I think some people eat whale.  But I think it's probably against the law.  And I think I heard that indigenous Alaskans used whale "products" for everything: fuel, meat, insulation... More stuff I may or may not have learned on PBS.  Whales are useful.  That's what I think I learned.  I wouldn't want the job to kill it though.

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Melville probably would have appreciated google searches.

 And then this idea of known nations.  It's so strange to think that today, nearly 200 years later, all nations are known.  Or are they?

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I'm excited that there are maps at the start of the book.  Excited because there's the prospect of reading about he 19th American century view of the rest of the world.  In the introduction, Feidelson mentioned that America was expanding at the time Melville wrote this and I can't help but think, at the time I am reading this book, the world is shrinking.  The world is smaller than it was when Melville wrote this book

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The man mildly loved his mortality? 

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These days, there would be the word "whale" in Arabic and in Chinese.

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Whale in Thai: ปลาวาฬ   pblah-wann

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Whales are named for roundness?  I would think they were named for massiveness.

Suggested by: Nithin

Here’s another idea about memorable first lines from books.

What are your favourite first sentences from books? Is there a book that you liked specially because of its first sentence? Or a book, perhaps that you didn’t like but still remember simply because of the first line?

It's funny that this would be a question for this group. When I reviewed The Monsters of Templeton, I basically answered these questions.  I was so drawn in to the story by the first line of that novel:

“The day I returned to Templeton steeped in disgrace, the fifty-foot corpse of a monster surfaced in Lake Glimmerglass.”

I knew that I had to keep reading.  It also called to mind the first lines of two other books that I have memorized:

“Call me Ishmael.”

I absolutely hated Moby Dick, that line is so famous, it will always be in my brain.

My all-time favorite first line comes from my all-time favorite novel, Gone with the Wind:

“Scarlett O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.”

So, my post from last year pretty much answered these questions.  It's a great topic and I'm looking forward to reading everyone else's answers.

As quartas no Moby neste mês de julho estão realmente IRADAS.

Os grupos de De Jeito Maneira e União Duradoura estão trazendo ao Moby uma galera jovem e bonita e, é claro, belas mulheres.

Se não não curte futebol, pelo menos agora, durante o mês de julho, você tem uma opção de programa a mais, além de ficar vendo Futebol na Globo.

As noites de quarta no Moby são uma promoção da Friends Eventos.

Vejam as fotos desta noite em slide show ou no álbum de fotos.

Deixem seu recados aqui!

A man named Charles Feidelson, Jr. edited my edition of The Whale (which I think is a very good way to refer to Moby Dick) and wrote the introduction. Here's a NY Times article about his death, and life, evidently: Charles Feidelson, Jr I google-imaged the man and it gave me a picture of Michael Jackson.

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From the preface, "... there are questions that arise, page by page, if one reads Moby Dick attentively, as Melville positively invites us to do." Reading this book attentively is my goal. I think attentiveness is my worst weakness (arguable, I'm sure). But I'm trying to get better at it. I should be good at concentrating but I think I'm getting worse. Sometimes I blame it on my hearing loss--do I lose words in a conversation and then lose my concentration? Sometimes I blame it on multitasking on the internet. If that's the case, I need to close all the chatters while I write. That's not rocket science. It's likely that the online conversations send my mind in several directions at once and that I will have to exercise some major discipline about those things when I'm trying to study or write. My mind is always full and spinning (and being brainwashed... hahaha). This is why I think Buddhist meditation has been a particularly appealing concept to me lately.

I must learn how to concentrate, which to me is the same as being "present," because well, life without the ability sounds unbearable to me. I'll miss everything. When I travel to a new place, I seem to have to force my mind to be "present." Look! It's a pretty waterfall (like the one P'George snapped and I stole for the heading of this blog...) Is that weird that I have to force my mind to notice things?

I've got a lot of reading to do but for The Whale, I want to pay attention.

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From the Introduction: When he met Hawthorn, "he felt he had found an ally in the creation of an American literature that would not be popular entertainment but 'The Art of Telling the Truth'"

And from the rest of this introduction, it seems to be the art of telling the dark, dark truth. Is truth always dark? Why are honesty and brutality usually associated together? Will there be honesty about beauty, too? Well, in 730 pages, there's gotta be.

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Melville had been "almost entirely forgotten as a writer when he died on September 28, 1891, at the age of 72." He and Woody. We humans tend to let our masters die by the wayside, don't we? Note to self + those secretly wishing to be masters: prepare for a lonely death.

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Melville's general method is described as "fictional enchancement of actual experiences." Now that is interesting... I wonder if, after two years of trying to master the art of fiction, the weak line between fiction and non-fiction will be any less blurred. And I wonder, after two years of trying to master the art of fiction, if I will be forgotten, alone, and dead.

Is this book as dark as the introduction?

I visited my college town where I'll be starting my graduate program in two weeks and the secretary for the English Dept. handed me a wad of paper filled with book titles for required reading, separate from reading assigned as coursework.  The first 15 titles are books I have to read and the rest I get to choose from.  50 books in all.  One of the 15 is Moby Dick.  I sighed. 

I'm not a fast reader though I can guarantee that after two years, I will be at least a faster reader.  I'm a bit out of practice.  The idea of reading Moby Dick on the side, in addition to every thing else, gives me a headache.  But today I picked up a used copy and have been thinking about how I will approach it.  I've decided to attempt a Moby Dick Project with this blog, where I write an entry for each bit I read.

So I'll take the book in chunks.  It doesn't seem to be the kind of book one "sits down to read."  I hope to all divinity the others are...  I'm not sure if the chunks will be chapters or what.  So this is my first entry for the Moby Dick project.

First, a paragraph dedicated to everything I know about Moby Dick before I started it:

It's an important book to my brother and my best friend and I've heard them discuss it a little. My friend took an entire class based on it, I think, and it might be the cornerstone of her PhD research that she will (also) start next fall.   She has told me that it's diverse--full of philosophy and anecdotes.  I think I remember her completing an assignment of adding a footnote to the text, or something like that. So I know it's full of footnotes.  I know it is fascinating and unusual; mysterious and massive as it's second title: The Whale.  I know the book is a whale.  It's 730 pages long.

I know there is a character named Starbuck, which might be the source of the coffee chain's name.

I know it is considered "great."  It's one of those that people always have in the back of their mind as a "should read."  Now I have it on my desk as a literal "must read."

So I've decided to take in the book like an element, maybe as a lifestyle, something I nibble on everyday to reflect on and see what comes out of it.  In my project, I don't expect every entry to be an interpretation of what I've read, but more like a medium for my reactions to what I've read.  Maybe sometimes the writing won't match up much to the content of The Whale.  But anyway, it sounds interesting.  I might just try it.  It might just take two years...