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Transcendentalism Research Essay

Author: Cindy Chen

Class: English Honors

Last Edit: 12/31/2013

The Whiteness of Moby Dick - A Matter of Perspective

White. What is white exactly? Purity? Goodness? Light? As Melville demonstrates in his novel, Moby Dick, Moby Dick, the most significant white object in the novel, can be seen in completely different lights depending on one's perspective. To Captain Ahab, Moby Dick is the manifestation of evil. However, Starbuck sees Moby Dick as something under God's protection.  Ishmael, on the other hand, does not see Moby Dick as either, and instead chooses to view Moby Dick through a scientific lense. Through these characters and Moby Dick, Melville shows how Moby Dick can be interpreted in completely different ways through one's perspective of the color white.

White is a symbol for many different concepts and ideas. In Christianity, white represents purity, holiness, and innocence. White is also the ceremonial color of Christmas and Easter, the most important holidays of Christianity (Anonymous, "Liturgical Colors: Christian Color Symbolism."). However, as Melville goes in depth into in chapter 42: The Whiteness of the Whale, white can also represent much more.

Captain Ahab’s hatred of Moby Dick is not only caused by the fact that it took off his leg, but also by the fact that Moby Dick is white. Captain Ahab can be inferred to be an Anti-Christ. His actions, such as his ceremony with his crew, drinking a drink wih the name of the devil, and the way he seems to challenge God, all seem to point towards the fact that he has turned his back on God and the light. Because of his renunciation of God, white, the color of God, symbolises evil to him. “The white whale [represents] God, or at least Christianity, to Ahab; since he is depicted as an antichrist, the whale could be seen by Ahab as a symbol of the religion which he feels ostracized from. [Ahab] feels that he is on a righteous quest to destroy the whale, and presents one perspective towards the nature of good and evil.” (Egomania84, “Herman Melville”) To Ahab, Moby Dick, a white whale, is a symbol of God, who is punishing Ahab for turning his back on Him. This perspective of white shows how Moby Dick can be interpreted as evil for his coloring.

Another interpretation of white comes from Starbuck, the first mate. Starbuck can be seen as a Christian. He constantly interprets events like the masts being struck by lightning and Ahab’s harpoon burning as signs from God throughout the entire voyage, allowing the reader to infer that he is a devout believer in God. Like Ahab, Starbuck sees Moby Dick’s unusual coloring as a sign that it is a representative of God. However, because of this, Starbuck views Moby Dick with wariness and awe, as opposed to Ahab’s hatred and anger, as he sees Moby Dick as under God's protection. Starbuck takes a much more mild view of Moby Dick, and, as a devout Christian, sees hunting Moby Dick as “ridiculous, if not actively against the will of God” (Shmoop, "Starbuck in Moby-Dick."). This view of Moby Dick shows how white can also be seen as holy and good.

Ishmael, on the other hand, sees white to represent many objects. Ishmael prefers to see things with a logical, scientific lense. “Whiteness, to Ishmael, is horrible because it represents the unnatural and threatening: albinos, creatures that live in extreme and inhospitable environments, waves breaking against rocks...Whiteness conveys both a lack of meaning and an unreadable excess of meaning that confounds individuals.” (SparkNotes, “SparkNote on Moby-Dick.”) As this quote says, Ishmael is unable to make sense of Moby Dick.  As he demonstrates in Chapter 32: Cetology, when he attempts to categorize all whales and make them fit a single stereotype and digging into Moby Dick’s albino coloring in Chapter 42: The Whiteness of the Whale, Ishmael constantly feels the need to make everything make sense. However, because he cannot figure out Moby Dick, Moby Dick becomes an unknown. As Moby Dick’s whiteness is its most obvious unusuality, white, also, by extension, becomes a symbol of the unknown. Due to this view, many other white things, such as the white shark and the albatross, become “unnatural and threatening”. This view of Moby Dick demonstrates how white can also be looked upon with fear and wariness.

These perspectives toward the color white demonstrate how something can be seen in completely different lights by different people, reflecting Melville's own belief that there is no such thing as good or evil, only how one views it. Ahab demonstrates how one can think of an object as evil, Starbuck shows how one can think of the same object as good, and Ishmael presents a perspective where the object is, instead, terrifying. One’s perspective on an element as simple as color can sway one’s entire way of thinking about a subject.

Bibliography

Anonymous. "Liturgical Colors: Christian Color Symbolism." ReligionFacts. 21 June 2013. Web. 30 December 2013 <http://www.religionfacts.com/christianity/symbols/colors.htm>.

Egomania84. “Herman Melville.” Oocities.org. Web. 23 December 2013 <http://www.oocities.org/egomania84/melville.html>.

Shmoop Editorial Team. "Starbuck in Moby-Dick." Shmoop.com. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 30 Dec. 2013.

SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on Moby-Dick.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2002. Web. 30 Dec. 2013.