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Hi Steve

Ok well this comment is just about one of the greatest things I've ever read. I love your enthusiasm too!! As a fellow "Whiteness of the Whale" apologist all I can say is simply that we get to experience more joy and happiness than the digression haters hahahh - What a chapter! I also find that he's able to take these beautiful, shining nuggets (almost like Ambergris??? :0) out of his digressions: Take a chapter like "The Blanket" where he humorously tries to define what the Whale's skin is. It's a lot of whale knowledge stuff, but in that classic great Melville prose, and he ultimately ends the whole thing with this bit of genius: "It does seem to me, that herein we see the rare virtue of a strong individual vitality, and the rare virtue of thick walls, and the rare virtue of interior spaciousness. Oh, man! admire and model thyself after the whale! Do thou, too, remain warm among ice. Do thou, too, live in this world without being of it. Be cool at the equator; keep thy blood fluid at the Pole. Like the great dome of St. Peter’s, and like the great whale, retain, O man! in all seasons a temperature of thine own." I mean COME. ON. If I repeated those words like a mantra for a couple of days and meditated upon them I think I would become a more solid person, someone who feels more steady and confident in a way that's not standoffish or proud. All at the end of a chapter on whale skin. The digression chapters RULE! And, obviously, the plot and the action in the book is simply astonishing. A pure thrill all the way through those last three chapters, it's like you can the sea-salt wind racing through your hair, the white flukes of Moby-Dick rising in the distance. That's a great point about the Hawthorne connection, all that stuff really is crazy. In the Norton Critical edition I had in this video there are all these letters sent to critics, publishers, and friends; and then there's the letters to Hawthorne and they're all just about 4 to 5 times as long as any of the other letters. I heard a writer once say that he developed "something that very much resembles a schoolgirl crush" for Hawthorne; I don't think he was trying to be insulting at all and I think it's probably true. Man what a joy just to think about all these things, thank you again for your wonderful comment :D

That's such a cool point about it working really well being read aloud! I imagine Willem Dafoe's performance in "The Lighthouse" would be a stellar manifestation of how well some Moby Dick scenes would work when read dramatically hahahhh, particularly for some of Ahab's speeches - If you haven't seen that film this clip will show you what I mean: ruclips.net/video/jfD5u9Ary6M/видео.html&ab_channel=Merty Those two chapters you mention are wonderful, I remember reading "The Sermon" on the lawn in college and wishing I had a Bible with me to read Jonah and the Whale. I also love the short chapters, it's somewhat like Anna Karenina in that respect; a chunker book that grants you lot of gratification along the way :)

@@RobinSongReadsI watched “The Lighthouse” for the first time a few days ago and loved the scene you referenced. Perfection. If you ever include the Bible on a future reread of Moby Dick, I recommend the King James Version. I think it would make a great match to Melville’s lyrical language. Reading update: I loved, loved Chapter 15. Chowder. I had to reread it several times. “Oh, sweet friends! hearken to me.” I’m a few pages away from meeting Ahab for the first time. The suspense! I’m also halfway through my reread of Anna Karenina, and may be enjoying it more than War and Peace. Maybe. How much of Tolstoy’s work have you delved into, or of Russian literature in general?

hahahh it seems my inner monologue was tripping over its words when my mouth was doing just fine. I guess these are the consequences of talking about something that makes you very excited!

hahahhh heck yes, just goes to show that monologuing for 30 minutes will get you just about anything you want ;)

Wow that's incredible that you read it white actually on Nantucket! Especially considering its significance in the book. I've never been to that particular island, but I was on Martha's Vineyard for about 9 days around one and a half years ago, and I definitely subconciously drew from it in creating my mental landscape/soundscape/smellscape of the early chapters. I'm honored to hear that my energy is inspiring hahah, and thank you so much for watching!

Thank you so much Pat! I definitely will, and I certainly am already. I was wondering if you have you ever taught this book, and if you have, what approach you took/would take if you were to teach it now. There's so many directions in which one could go, and I would love to hear your educator's perspective :)

@@RobinSongReads So this is very strange. I left you a long, detailed response, and it has been deleted! I was trying to tell you about a course that is being offered this summer at the graduate school where I got my degree on Moby-Dick. I immediately thought of you, and I'd love to send you this course description. I'm not sure why comment would have been deleted. I also told you which works of Melville we did teach, although we did not teach M-D. It's difficult to incorporate super long novels in the curriculum in high school, though I certainly did teach a number of longish novels. M-D would be a rough one in high schools, although I do know people who did read it in their high school classes. We taught Billy Budd, Bartleby the Scrivener, and some of Melville's poetry. I was also trying to tell you about Nathaniel Philbrick. He wrote the intro to my edition of M-D. He also won the National Book Award for In the Heart of the Sea, the Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex. The ordeal of the Essex was Melville's inspiration for M-D. Philbrick has also written a great book, Why Read M-D? I think you'd love that, if you haven't read it already. Anyway, if this comment gets through, maybe we can figure out how I can get this course description on M-D to you.

​@@BookChatWithPat8668 Oh no I'm so sorry your comment got deleted!! That is one of the worst feelings - but this comment you left in its place is very beautiful and made me smile. I get what you mean about it being difficult to incorporate long novels into a high school curriculum, and I think it's probably best that Moby-Dick is not often assigned in high school, lest younger readers get turned off to an author with so much depth and wonder, simply because they were assigned his longest, most bizarre work first. I read Bartleby, the Scrivener in both high school and college, and still think that's an amazing introduction to Melville. I'm very excited to take the dive into his poetry, thank you for putting that back on my radar! And that is a great suggestion to get more into Nathaniel Philbrick. I watched a talk that he gave on Moby-Dick and he read a passage from Why Read Moby-Dick? which I, naturally, loved. After my next re-read of M-D I'd like to read it as a kind of digestif. There's no come-down quite like finishing a great book, and that'll be something I can look forward to :)

hahahh thank you very much, you are very kind :)

Thank you so much dude! I wouldn't call that a fault on your part at all hahahh - some things just take getting used to, and Melville's style can be, well... a lot. It makes me so happy to hear that you'd like to give it another go one day, and if you ever do return to it I would be super stoked to hear your thoughts!

I’ll definitely return to it. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

hahahahhhh well this just absolutely made my day, you are too kind. i guess it's the constant grinning i'm doing because of my excited-nervousness that gives me the fanart aesthetic lmaooo

Thank you so so much Karen, it's a pleasure to be here! I hope you're having a nice holiday season :)

Hello there fellow newbie!! Maaann what a pleasure it is to be so warmly received into a community like this, MJ is so kind. I saw in your booktube newbie tag that you like historical fiction, that's definitely a big blind spot of mine in my reading and I hope to fix that one day! Hope you're having a nice holiday season :)

Thank you so much!! I'm excited to make said future videos :) I saw in your channel description that you enjoy Japanese literature - maybe I'll make a video on the Tale of Genji in the future

Thank you so so much! I just watched your video on Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening and it was so wonderful. That was the first poem I ever fell in love with, and is still one of my favorites to this day. The peace rock at the end was a delightful touch :)

Funny enough I got it in German Studies hahahh - hence the flag of Germany pinned to that jacket. I loved my major but looking back English/Literature would have been wonderful too. Thank you for your kind words and I'm glad you like the fairy lights, took me forever to string them up but it's SO worth it. Especially when all the lights are off, then it really does become an enchanted forest. I love your Lady of Shalott profile picture and the Ghibli username, my favorite film of all time just so happens to be Princess Mononoke!

@@RobinSongReads Ooo very cool! I have a lot of vines in my room too but no fairy lights so maybe that'll be my next addition. I really like Elaine (I have a tapestry of this painting too) and Arthuriana so she's my pfp a lot lol. Also Princess Mononoke is my favorite too :)

Thank you so much Mark! And many thanks for bringing that to my attention, I just went over to her channel and it truly warmed my heart. It seems like a good time to be new on booktube! Just subbed to your channel and about to watch your video on the Lord of the Rings, I've been doing loads of winter cleaning whilst listening to The Return of the King on audible, and I'm preparing for the emotional devastation that is sure to follow when I complete it. Hopefully I'll be ready, this being my second go around, but we'll just have to see :) Happy holidays!

@@RobinSongReads Happy Merry Season etc, and good luck with LOTR [I have just recorded an episode on Aragorn]. And MJ is a treasure.

Спасибо и добро пожаловать! You are so so kind hahahh, i'm happy to hear that my somewhat excited energy in this video was calming for you :) And I am honored to have a russian speaking person watching my videos! I truly love Russian literature - Anna Karenina is probably my third favorite book of all time, and I plan on reading the Brothers Karamazov with my girlfriend soon. And it's amazing to hear that Lermontov is in your dna hahahh, that is very well expressed! Did you read him growing up/ in school? I only came around to him later in college. Anyways thank you so much again and have a wonderful holiday season :))

Thank you so so much! It's an honor to have Tolstoy watching my videos ;))

I legitimately laughed out loud when I read this hahahahh, what an amazing response. I think I've figured out how to get around the mirror effect, and you'll be reading left to right again in no time ;)

Thank you so so much, you are so kind!! I have unfortunately not yet gotten to Wuthering Heights - the Victorian Period (and the Bronte Sisters) represent a large gap in my reading that I can't wait to get around to. I really hope you enjoy it, I've heard that it can be read almost as a sort of horror novel which makes it very enticing :)

Thank you so much!! Welcome to you as well, this is quite a nice corner of youtube to find ourselves in :)) I'm glad you like the enchanted forest, it gets even more magical when I turn off the overheads and let the fairy lights work their magic

@@RobinSongReads I can believe! :)

Hahahahh thank you so much!! I just watched your video on "Behave" by Robert Sapolsky and loved it, I hope you'll make more videos someday :)

@ Thank you, that means a lot frankly.

You’ve also completely sold me on A Hero of Our Time. I’ll be on the lookout for that one.

I think I may have read an abridged version for children when I was in elementary school, so I've also got the skeleton of the story in my head. I think those action-packed books like Kidnapped and Treasure Island are going to be a really nice contrast from the Tale of Genji, which is subtle, deliberate, and beautiful. After 1200 pages of subtle, deliberate, and beautiful, sometimes you just want some pirates.

@@AnEruditeAdventure Awesome man I think you'll love it. It's a quick read and really transports you into the Caucasus.

I've not read the Nabokov translation but would love to give it a shot! The translator in this video's edition (and the one Penguin has had for years) is Paul Foote, which I think is the one we've both read. I really enjoyed it as well, but as a fan of this book I'll try to get my hands on the new translation at some point.

Thank you so much Nicholas!! I'm so stoked to be here, and I feel very welcomed thanks to kind words like yours :)

Hahahahh then it must be a near-universal experience among its readers! Lermontov is incredible, and may well have been an author near the caliber of Tolstoy and Pushkin, but we'll never know. He was killed in a duel when he was 26 years old. Many great Russian authors never wrote anything near the quality of "A Hero of Our Time" when they were in their twenties, and here was this young poet greeting the world with a great novel and dying one year later. I've never read his poetry, which my Russian professor told me was astonishing in the original, but didn't work so well in translation, but maybe a great translator will come along one day and give it the glory it deserves. Thank you for your kind words, perhaps my enthusiasm is an outlet for my somewhat nervous excitement at doing these videos hahahh - we'll see if I settle down at all in the future :))

I can’t believe I had never heard of the author before! Thank you for the recommendation.

It certainly was, I've not felt so excited at being in a shop like that for a while. And you're completely right about Mark and Steve! Both of them have also recommended the naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison so I'll be on the lookout for him as well. I'm glad you enjoyed the Pride and Prejudice story and thank you so much for your kinds words, I hope you have a wonderful holiday season :)

Just wait till you see me in my pine-cone decorated beanie. I'll be getting more elf-like in each successive video.

Thank you so much Pat! This is a very wholesome and beautiful corner indeed, and you're a very bright spot in it :) I'm glad you liked hearing about Moby Dick - one of the things I'm most excited to do on this channel is talk at length about books that I particularly love, and Moby Dick will certainly get more attention. I look forward to more videos of yours as well and thank you for stopping by!

Thank you so much, David! I'm really hoping this'll be more like a Love Train situation than a Murder on the Orient Exprest type deal.

Goodness gracious, it's an honor to recieve words from Stately Vaughan Manor! I positively love your channel, and you've put authors like Dashiell Hammett and Robert E. Howard on my radar - Thank you for that, and I can't wait to get to them :) I completely agree with you about Moby Dick. I could exhaust most of the adjectives of the English language in attempts to characterize that book, but fantastic is a particularly apt one. And that edition certain is durable... perhaps a little too durable! It's heavy as hell hahahh

Thanks so much! Great to hear that all this Moby talk makes you want to give it a reread :D And violin, wow, that's crazy impressive. I don't play any fretless instruments, but I've fooled around on a Cello a couple of times and it felt like I was walking on ice in flat slippers. I think bowed instruments are much like human voices in their ability to steadily crescendo - a voice and a violin go really well together :)

absolutely. As long as you get past the squeaky stage. Although that can apply to both violin and voice. 😅

Thank you very much James :)

Thank you so much! It's very nice to be here in this way :)

Maaannn that makes me so happy to hear it had a positive impact on your day :) You are certainly more of an expert than me, and I'll keep an eye out for "Opened Ground" - maybe I'll look up what selections are in there and read some of the poems within them on the Poetry Foundation website. I look forward to your future videos as well, and I especially love your poetry readings!

Maybe I’ll try to show the volume in my next poetry video, which will hopefully be soon. 🙂

Thank you so very much Hannah! I'm glad you think so hahahh, I certainly can't wait to talk about those books in depth with y'all. Perhaps sometime down the line I'll point y'all in the direction of my music, but for now I'm happy to keep this channel solely book focused (although we'll see how long that lasts, it seems I can't go very long without mentioning music in some way... :))

@ 🤓

You are so kind for saying that, I'm glad you enjoyed the video! I can't wait to make more

Hahahahh, I am not at all brilliant enough to have mentioned that on purpose - you have a very keen eye :)

Just one of the many joys we share of being in our twenties! ;)

@@RobinSongReads but old fogies are always underestimating us! It's so frustrating!