As I was reading this rather well known novel, I began to wonder if maybe all of the people who had protested recent Japanese ‘scientific’ whaling activity in the South Pacific haven’t read Moby Dick. And I knew at once that if they had, then they’d be laying down their Greenpeace placards and picking up the nearest available harpoon as quickly as their soap-dodging bodies would let them.

Moby Dick really is the kind of ‘boy’s adventure’ to inspire curiosity about whaling though. Melville’s style, while quite formal due to the period it was penned in, is clearly laid out and beautifully written as you would expect from such a renowned classic – but it’s actually really funny as well, which (to me) was quite unexpected. Combined with the rather lengthy detail he delves in to about whaling, whaling ships, whaling instruments and whaling procedures, the book really is quite an eye opening window into the mid-nineteenth century heating oil industry (which I’m sure you’re just dying to find out about). In 1850 if you wanted to keep warm, you most likely used some sort of whale oil to heat your residence or power your lamps.

Told in the first person through the character of Ishmael, the story follows the whaling ship Pequod, captained by the mysterious Ahab who had lost a leg to the great white whale, Moby Dick, during a previous attempt to catch the beast. While most people would leave a gigantic creature weighing more than 40 tons alone after being wounded by it, the clearly brilliant Ahab takes the injury as a personal affront and seeks out revenge against the creature.

The last few chapters of the novel are really where the action is though, the early parts are really made up of whaling history, techniques and a reasonable amount of Ahab’s history with the white whale.

Whenever I start getting into a piece of ‘classic literature’ like this, I always find myself thinking: “Gee, this is well done – they should teach this kind of thing to kids in schools.” Before I realise that they probably did try to teach it to us but we were more interested in having cool hair and clothes.

If you’re up for a good read with some fairly informative adventure, I highly recommend Moby Dick.

Rating: 4/5