- Paperback: 224 pages
- ISBN-10: 0465076971
- ISBN-13: 978-0465076970
- Shipping Weight: 504 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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From Publishers Weekly
In the role of adventurer-cum-historian, Severin (The Brendan Voyage, etc.) has built leather boats and replicas of ninth-century Arab dhows in order to re-create the voyages of St. Brendan, Jason and the Argonauts, and Sindbad. His new adventure explores Melville's white whale and the culture of the gifted harpooners who are the last people on earth to hunt whales from small boats. Melville himself met such men when he deserted a whaling ship in French Polynesia in 1842, and Severin returns to the same island, Nuku Hiva. There he collects the information that allows him to dissect the myths and facts of Melville's Typee, and convincingly argue that Moby-Dick was influenced by Melville's contact with the Nuku Hivans. Severin also expounds on the disaster of the whaleship Essex, the habits of the great mammals themselves and the spiritual and mystical aspects of the Polynesians' whale hunts. A description of a young islander's coming of age in a successful hunt is transfixing. The author's firsthand account of whaling from a small boat is equally powerful. Severin is mystified that the whales don't flee as the hunters draw near enough to attack: "Where is their sense of self-preservation?" But the hunters know: the whale gives himself to those who have performed the ritual; just as surely, the whale will punish those who are greedy or negligent. This, Severin suggests, is the root of Melville's spiteful cetacean: Ahab was unworthy, and Moby-Dick delivered divine retribution in accordance with islander lore. The islanders' generations of experience, legend and myth are the authorities for Severin, as valid to him as any laboratory test results, and his description of their culture is profoundly moving. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Beginning with his first book, Tracking Marco Polo, Severin has specialized in retracing famous historical or fictional voyages and journeys. (Other recent examples include In Search of Genghis Khan, The China Voyage: A Pacific Quest by Bamboo Raft, and The Spice Island Voyage: The Quest for Alfred Wallace, the Man who Shared Darwin's Discovery of Evolution.) In this book, Severin travels to the South Pacific in search of the great white sperm whale immortalized in Melville's Moby Dick. In the Philippines, he accompanies hunters who jump on the backs of manta rays and whale sharks to set the hook, and in Indonesia, he follows the hunt for the sperm whale, using a hand-thrown harpoon. References to Melville and his book are made throughout this well-written and interesting travel adventure, and although Severin himself never encounters a great white whale, he ably relates the stories and legends he hears during his travels. Recommended for large public and academic libraries as well as those where Severin's previous books have been popular.DJohn McCormick, New Hampshire State Lib., Concord
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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