summer reading [1/?]
In lieu of whatever it was I actually meant to post about, going to do a little dance about last week finally getting out of the mini-no comprende palabras reading slump I was in and getting my reading hat back on.
i
Sometime in the past few months I caught part of a general history of whaling documentary on PBS, which (hello, elision of commentary re: monumentally horrific practice and meta-commentary on humanity as a species) led to chasing down [1] N Philbrick's In the Heart of the Sea, about the sinking of the Essex and how the survivors, uh, survived (rowing across half the Pacific in a whaleboat with nothing to eat but each other, basically) and [2] sparked a desire to reread Moby Dick. I read it (you know, voluntarily, of my initiative, outside of school) about 5/6? years ago and realized I could not remember anything about it at all beyond “that was not at all what I was expecting” and “hey, that was actually good.”
I kept trying to will a Norton Critical edition into materializing at the UBS, but even better, a right awesome Longman Critical Edition turned up instead. Aside from the usual background/history essays and (glorious!) plethora of annotations and footnotes, it also in-textually compares the British and American editions/revisions, which is just fantastic (the British Victorian editors were about as uptight as you'd expect and edit-happy about anything remotely “blasphemous”). Not very far along, just up to ch. 19 41 (they're short and fast - yes, that's right), so just some off-the-cuff asides:
i
Sometime in the past few months I caught part of a general history of whaling documentary on PBS, which (hello, elision of commentary re: monumentally horrific practice and meta-commentary on humanity as a species) led to chasing down [1] N Philbrick's In the Heart of the Sea, about the sinking of the Essex and how the survivors, uh, survived (rowing across half the Pacific in a whaleboat with nothing to eat but each other, basically) and [2] sparked a desire to reread Moby Dick. I read it (you know, voluntarily, of my initiative, outside of school) about 5/6? years ago and realized I could not remember anything about it at all beyond “that was not at all what I was expecting” and “hey, that was actually good.”
I kept trying to will a Norton Critical edition into materializing at the UBS, but even better, a right awesome Longman Critical Edition turned up instead. Aside from the usual background/history essays and (glorious!) plethora of annotations and footnotes, it also in-textually compares the British and American editions/revisions, which is just fantastic (the British Victorian editors were about as uptight as you'd expect and edit-happy about anything remotely “blasphemous”). Not very far along, just up to ch. 19 41 (they're short and fast - yes, that's right), so just some off-the-cuff asides:
- the text is fluid and snappy, and - you guys (possibly especially for those of you with a Th. Hardy/Victorian twitch) - Melville is funny.
- Ishmael's rather neurotic and his epic buddy-life debt-bromance with Queequeg is something else. (No, they/I don't read them as gay, because this is not that kind of Victorian novel, and cultural/time differences etc etc, but it's definitely an epic band of brothers pressed-foreheads-while-rolling-around-in-bed-together (I am not making any of that up) life-bond they've got going here.)
- I can't believe I have absolutely no memory whatsoever of this, although I do at least remember reading it (it was a nice American Library edition, but no extras).
- Finally under sail, and Ahab's appeared on deck.
eta They've quaffed the grog and have committed to the hunt. - I cannot stress how much I am thoroughly enjoying reading this.