Moby Dick

Moby Dick is the 1851 novel by Herman Melville describing the voyage of the whaling ship Pequod commanded by Captain Ahab who leads his crew on a hunt for the great whale, Moby-Dick. The narrator's reflections, along with complex descriptions of the grueling work of whaling and the personalities of his shipmates, are woven into a profound meditation on society, nature, and the human struggle for meaning, happiness, and salvation. Moby Dick is often considered the epitome of American Romanticism. The novel frequently employs Shakespearean devices, including formal stage directions and extended soliloquies and asides. The first line of Chapter One -"Call me Ishmael."- is one of the most famous in American literature. Moby-Dick is considered to be one of the greatest novels in the English language.