White Whale

In which we chase metaphorical whales and bugs

I.

Confession: I didn’t enjoy reading Moby Dick. The majority of the book is a - in my opinion tedious - nautical account of a whaling expedition.

And yet, Melville’s most famous work has harpooned itself firmly into the blubber of our cultural history. There are probably several reasons for this, but one of them might be its depiction of Captain Ahab’s obsession with finding and killing the infamous whale that ate his leg. Consider this paragraph:

Captain Ahab stood erect, looking straight out beyond the ship’s ever-pitching prow. There was an infinity of firmest fortitude, a determinate, unsurrenderable wilfulness, in the fixed and fearless, forward dedication of that glance. Not a word he spoke;…

You can feel it, don’t you, the relentless obsession of the captain?

(Fun fact: the story of Moby Dick was based on the real-life story of the white sperm whale Mocha Dick that was killed in 1838, about 13 years before Captain Ahab’s tale appeared.)

An alternative (and shorter) tale about obsession appeared ten years before Moby Dick. The Gold-Bug by the inimitable Edgar Allen Poe is similar in set-up to the whale tale. The key character of the story is William Legrand, who becomes fixated on an unusual gold-colored bug he has discovered. Unlike Melville, Poe doesn’t require a lot of buildup before the madness of obsession reveals itself:

Legrand had been awaiting us in eager expectation. He grasped my hand with a nervous empressement which alarmed me and strengthened the suspicions already entertained. His countenance was pale, even to ghastliness, and his deep-set eyes glared with unnatural lustre.

Do you feel it? The prickle on your arms, the clammy hands?

I think we relate to these stories of obsession because we all have a white whale.

(Fun fact 2: I actually had a short story published about a necromancer on an expedition to a frozen sea loosely based on Moby Dick, Voodoo lore, and - why not? - political philosophy.)

II.

As readers, we see the Moby Dick story unfold through the eyes of sailor Ishmael, who joins one of Ahab’s obsessive expeditions. Throughout the voyage, Ishmael contemplates the sublime and he alternates in seeing the endless ocean and the elusive white whale as symbols for this vague concept of ‘sublime’.

Literary scholars tend to focus on the role of the sublime in the tale of the white whale. While probably a valid focus for the text’s analysis, I think this also unnecessarily complicates things. We, landlubbers, prefer our feet on solid ground. So let’s set the sublime aside and journey to (and through) obsession.

I don’t want to focus on unhealthy obsession here, in which an idea or feeling pervades everything you think and do to the point where it prevents you from functioning. I’d rather focus on obsession in the form of the aspirations we have but bury (like a golden bug?).

I think we all have those ambitions or goals that are slightly unrealistic and uncomfortable to share.

My head is the territory of a few white whales and several scuttling golden bugs, but I think there’s only one real Moby Dick.

Without further ado, here’s my white whale.

III.

While I have a firm scientific educational/academic background, one of the few red threads of my adult life is that I’ve always been creatively writing in some way. I’ve even had the good fortune of having stories picked up by kind editors to be published in nice places.

Among other things, I delude myself into thinking I’m a writer. That’s not my white whale, this is: I want to be an author. It feels oddly personal and vulnerable to share this, but hey, since we’re here, let’s see where it goes.

By author I mean someone who writes stories (real or imagined) for a living independently, aka not for an employer (I write non-fiction as part of the day job).

However, just like [spoiler alert] Moby Dick eventually drags Ahab into the ocean and (presumably) kills him, so too my white whale will end me.

While I am not a publishing industry insider by any stretch of the imagination, I’ve glimpsed a pale and ghostly glimmer of my whale’s flukes. The publishing industry has always been competitive, but it’s in a particularly tough spot right now. Take some AI generative hijinks, add a coterie of only a few publishing houses that have a quasi-monopoly on the industry, and it’s not looking good for aspiring authors.

Of course, there are medium and small indie presses, but those are not in the brightest spot either. Thanks to some wonderful and talented indie authors I occasionally (virtually) interact with, I know that the overworked and underpaid staff at indie presses is inundated by manuscripts, of which they can only select, at best, a handful.

Unless you are a unicorn whose debut is backed by one of the big publishing house’s marketing departments, being an author is going to be ridiculously tough and unrealistic unless you already have a large network/audience (which is also very true for anyone thinking of self-publishing).

I have neither. Also, additional problem: if you’ve read some of my posts here you’ll know that I have a, let’s say, voice-y style. And that’s when I’m already doing my best to contain it. Imagine the stories I actually want to write… As a result, my writing style is - understandably - not everyone’s cup of tea. That’s totally fine. It does, however, make me ‘difficult to market’.

Of course, there are many aspects of this whole endeavor I haven’t touched upon, such as (lack of) talent, dedication, sheer luck, persistence, and all that jazz. And yes, perhaps I need to stop rambling and start bloody writing.

Still, can you feel it, the unnatural luster in my deep-set eyes?

Now tell me, what’s your Moby Dick?

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