#mobie review

[holidayjoecoffee]

For Richer or Poorer (1997)

Sitcom-style comedy starring Tim Allen and Kirstie Alley as an unhappily married couple who hide out from the taxmen among the Amish.

It's very silly and more than a little corny but it's actually an okay watch. Maybe I just have a soft spot for Tim Allen.

It's a bit schmaltzy but it's sweet in parts and has a few laughs.

[burningvelvet]

36 chapters into moby dick. some thoughts:

- take a shot every time he expresses his love for nantucket or whaling trivia

- i know everyone said it was queer and usually i've come to expect that as hyperbole but this time they weren't joking

- CHILDE HAROLD REFERENCE?!?!?!?!?! BYRON QUOTED?!?!?!?! not surprised bc it is the romantic genre which byron & chp helped inspire & he was the best selling writer in early 19c usa & is noted for his oceanic refs & he & esp childe harolds pilgrimage esp are both noted on wikipedia's "nautical fiction" page but like. i had no idea they were immortalized in moby dick

- "Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian." AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH

- does gay cannibal tumblr know about queequeg & ishmael?

- utterly obsessed with captain ahab for numerous reasons but does anyone else notice how similar he is to captain flint from black sails? like he's literally him but a bit older & combined with silver's leglessness.

- the part where ahab calls stubb a dog lmao

- ishmael getting worried for queequeg when he couldn't find him omg...

- "Where's that girl ? — there, Betty, go to Snarles the Painter, and tell him to paint me a sign, with — 'no suicides permitted here, and no smoking in the parlor;' — might as well kill both birds at once." MRS. HUSSEY!!!!

- i'm sure that all the focus on queequegs spirituality & his consultation with his god yojo wherein he was informed that ishmael had to pick their boat bc yojo demaded it TOTALLY won't prove to have any prophetic and symbolic consequences later on or anything

- love how the chapters are nice and short but on the flip side that means theyre tricking me into thinking i have less to go than i actually do... as long as i get more ahab i'm good i guess

-melville, at random: and now we take a break from our regularly schedule programming to give you . . . WHALE FACTS! [whips out multiple books on the history of whales and whaling, begins to recite]

[tilbageidanmark]

Moby Dick bound in off-white Morocco leather, 280 illustrations by Rockwell Kent 1930. From Exeter Bookbinders.

[saranilssonbooks]

Developmental psychology scholar read Cozy Classics' Moby-Dick! Here are the thougts.

For those who haven't heard of the Cozy Classics, they are a series of board book adaptions of great classics such as Oliver Twist, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and Jane Eyre, created by Jack and Holman Wang and intended for young children. What makes these books stand out, however, is that they come with a most delightful needle felted twist!

Each book contains 12 illustrations, consisting of photographs depicting scenes from the original story and featuring needle felted characters and props.

In addition to this, 12 words related to the story are printed in-between the illustrations; "sailor", "leg", "boat", "find"...

...et cetera. Guess Moby-Dick gets a bonus word though, since "Pequod" is ever so neatly embroidered on the ship's fluffy name plate.

I have to say that this whole concept is nothing short of genius. Not only are the little ones presented with the classics fitting their own level of perception, but the materials shown in the pictures are all familiar ones to them sensory-wise, thus much more relatable than conventional illustrations.

As for the words, they are fitting 1-2 syllable ones, but their meaning - at least in this case - are somewhat unsual. I'm telling you, one doesn't find educational toddler literature containing "smash", "sink", and "mad" together all that often. The choice of words in combination with the pictures also works in an almost insidious fashion in that they will now be forever planted in the lil' one's brain and for the rest of their life they will recognize that peg legged dude with anger issues.

The book manages to capture the essence of the original quite well and what truly surprised me was how the creators did not hold back on the dark stuff. Ahab looks like something that definately will come crawling out from under your bed at night for a maniacal stabbing session, Moby Dick turns the Pequod to splinters, and a heart broken Ishmael floats around on a coffin. Even the color scheme is moody and ominous. We approve! 👍

Even if you don't have a child nearby to brain wash, I highly recommend you check this book out - it's up for a free read on archive.org - for the sake of admiring the pieces of downright wool art.

So, there's the Cozy Classics Moby-Dick for ya. Now I have to go ponder whether I should add a request for a needle felted coffin in my death plan.

[dusttt]

When I was a kid, I opened Moby Dick for the first time, to the very page in which a de facto marriage ceremony was occurring between two men

[menderash]

guys where's that moby dick post someone made that was like 'imagine a whale. now imagine the whale is death and god and life and just a whale. now imagine the hottest man ever. that's my husband.' i cant FIND IT

[coulson-is-an-avenger]

KILL THE WHALE (LYRICS AND COMMENTARY)

HELLO! Over the past couple of months I have been making it a personal project to transcribe and annotate the lyrics for Daniel Emond's musical adaptation of Moby Dick, called "Kill The Whale".

For those unfamiliar with this album/adaptation, here is the official description of it right from Emond's website:

Kill the Whale is a concept album and live rock opera, built in the characters and waters of Melville's Moby Dick. When Ishmael, a young rocker with an unknown past falls in love with the hiphop harpooner Q, they join Peek-Wow, the Whaleship/Orchestra led by steel-eyed frontwoman Ahab, who sets her crew upon a course to kill the gigantic sperm whale that maimed her, a plan opposed by Ahab's first mate (and secret admirer), the devout and soulful Starbuck. Contending with face-melting squalls and mad mates, the hymnic wonder of whales nursing in the heart of the Ocean, and the poignant Gospel of the castaway cabin kid Pip, Peek-Wow embarks on a rock and roll quest for vengeance. Kill The Whale is memory manifested as a 1970's folk/hiphop/rock opera, that centers two queer romances, lifts voices of color, and re-casts authority roles as women.

The album was released on Spotify in April of this year, with two live performances at Joe's Pub taking place only a few days after it's release.

I have archived and noted the lyrics as they appear in the studio album, the live variation, and Daniel's "official" lyrics as posted to his personal Reddit, and the differences therein. I and my good Melville scholar friend and partner @pocketsizedquasar-2 have also left extensive commentary, notes of context, and criticisms of this album in the document. Please enjoy the fruit of much labor and insanity :)

[laddersofsweetmisery]

He did not 🤣

"besides, I ain't insured."

Are we sure this was written in 1851? lol

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

[wlwbookshelf]

MOBY DYKE - KRISTA BURTON

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐⭐️

The subtitle of this novel, 'An Obsessive Quest To Track Down The Last Remaining Lesbian Bars In America' really explains what this travelogue is all about.

Moby Dyke makes me, an introverted homebody, yearn to go to a lesbian bar. I literally started figuring out plans to do to the nearest one after I finished reading. I really don’t know what higher praise this book could get from me.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[bookreviewcoffee]

Moby-Dick, or The Whale Herman Melville 🐳

"The sea knows no mercy. It knows no power but its own."

A whale is a powerful mammal, the largest animal on our planet. In general, when you imagine such a giant, it is already scary to be near him, it seems that this hulk will just swallow you. In fact, a person is interested to see and learn what we almost never meet in life. And here is a work about sea hunters, about what it is like to go out to sea and try to destroy the might. In fact, reading the book, I understood that the author wants us not only to show images of people who are connected with the sea, there is a special meaning here, which I will write about a little later.

First of all, this book is about nature, about the confrontation between man and the elements, about how important it is to prove first of all to yourself that you can win over such a creature.

It is a kind of manual about the life of the sea giant, it was very interesting to read about the habits, the way of life of whales, the sounds that they make, in general cognitive reading (for those who are interested).

Another aspect is the work of the whalers. On the one hand there will be hatred towards them, because they kill animals, and on the other hand there can be pity, because it is quite a difficult job they have, and to kill an animal is not as easy as it seems.

Some people romanticise the sea, it seems that going from land to unexplored sea distances there you will find harmony, peace and tranquility, but everything is first of all in a man's head, it is impossible to escape from himself, it is necessary on land to understand what is a destructive factor.

These reflections and many others, the author informs us with the help of his work, which is certainly not only a fiction-adventure book.

Images, which draws the author of the work ambiguous and each reader will make his conclusions according to his worldview, because there is no unity, there is only the path on which each person goes and which he chooses himself.

As it is said: "Let the path be for the one who walks.

[stalkiwi]

So about this Canto V... (Spoilers)

I rather say it straight, my review is quite negative, so if you loved Canto V, you should ignore this. I don't like to put bad vibes in the main tag, but I wanted to give my opinion on this Canto.

This Canto was... Disappointing. I love Ishmael, I love Moby Dick, I truly do, and I had high expectations. Especially because, I know Project Moon is good at making us feel things, so I was confident with this Canto. I was confident it would be as good as the last one. But... There are things.

I'm not going to talk much about the CG or character designs. I will be honest, the new characters designs were really mid, Queequeg and Ahab were the two to stand out, and yet, even so, I did not saw them very great. Yet god knows I love evil old women and butch she/her himbo. I feel sad that Nai_Ga had to, well, literally carry the entire visuals of the Canto, did every background, every character, every CG. I hope he's paid tripple for his work. But also it felt like rushed, naturally, when you're the only artist working on a whole game's chapter, there's high chances that it will look low quality. But at the same time, since VellMori left the crew, I can't say much. I really, really hope they can find new artists. I love your art style, Nai_Ga, but dear god we need to discuss how you draw muscled arms.

ANYWAY, now into the real subject; what really disappointed me in this chapter. The feels.

I AM going to compare it a lot to Canto IV, naturally. It was the previous Canto, so it's hard to not compare them, especially with how good Canto IV was. It's like eating a very dull and mid dessert after an absolute banger of a feast.

The characters were not attaching. At all.

Let's talk about Ahab first, the main antagonist. She's... Well, a very fucked up old lady. She's senile and obsessed by her revenge. Which, well, makes sense! But it gives no sympathy whatsoever to the character. Comparing to Dongrang, the antagonist of the previous Canto, she was not a grey antagonist. She was all black. All evil. Which is BAD when Project Moon has been serving us really morally grey characters before. She's obssessed, she's ready to throw her crewmates to death for her own desires, she just wants to kill that Damned Whale. And this was so, so bad when at the end, Ishmael spares Ahab. WHY would you spare this absolutely madlad. Sure, Ishmael doesn't want to be like her, but Ahab had absolutely no reason to be left alive. She will just be more evil, AND join the evil people gang to be even MORE evil. That's fucked up. Yes, Kromer was also some unhinged feral woman, but she fought for something and was not just evil, but smart. She was scary BECAUSE she was smart. Ahab, at first she was shown as charismatic, that she can manipulate... But she quickly, way too quickly fell into "just some senile old woman." Starbuck and Queequeg followed her because she was the reason they were still alive, she was their lighthouse. But at the end of the dungeon, even after she shouted with absolutely no shame that she's ready to kill her crew, after Queequeg discovered with horrors that she sacrified everyone to make her way to the heart, she... Still joins Ahab? Without, even a second thought? Queequeg, you KNEW Ahab had not a single care for you, that she was ready to use your body for the steps that would lead her to her ambition. WHY, you followed her, and DIED for her till the end.

And Queequeg is my next point. She could, she SHOULD have been a character I enjoy a lot, but instead I felt neutral about her. A character we can associate to her in the previous Canto is Dongbaek. And now, we get a hint; all the Pequod crew was introducted way too late. They got introduced at the start of the Dungeon, and all died at the end of the Dungeon. Compared to Kromer, to Dongrang and Dongbaek who were introduced way before. We saw the memories of Sinclair and Yi Sang with them, we saw the interactions, the good moments, and that's how we got attached to them. Unfortunately, for the Pequod's crew, from the start of Canto V to the start of the Dungeon, we got absolutely nothing. Just their names mentioned. We should have got flashbacks. We barely saw Ishmael interact with Pip or Starbuck, and even her interactions with Queequeg, they were sure, adorable and heartwarming, but I could not feel the attachment between them that much as I was able to feel it between Yi Sang and Dongbaek. Dongbaek gave us an amazing boss fight, despite being not the final boss (Queequeg had a boss fight too, but! Too bad! It was just some random looking fight.), she gave us amazing memories of her and Yi Sang, and she died a heartbreaking death.

Queequeg, not only you had to guess that she was dead because at no moment it was showed, but all she got is around five lines of dialogues, Ishmael's crying sprite, "oh no!, anyway. that whale's not going to die alone."

Then we got Pip, Starbuck, and Stubb. Who? They appeared, they had a bit of dialogues, then they disappeared. Reduced to atoms.

This is really sad, because Project Moon always had a talent to make us attached to characters, then once they were growing into our hearts, kill them. I mostly think about Xiao, about Yan, we saw those characters evolve throught the story of Library of Ruina, we followed them, we saw their struggles, we saw their feelings, we fought them, the music playing behind broke our hearts, and we killed them. It was painful, it was hard, and even after they're gone, we will still think about them. We will read their books and discover even more. The promise Xiao and Lowell made that she broke after his death, how Yan had been chosen as a messenger just after he tried to take his own life away.

Queequeg, Ahab, and the rest of the Pequod's Crew are forgettable. And this is AWFUL for a Project Moon game.

And Ishmael's evolution... The conclusion felt, quite random. A few time I felt bad for her during the Canto, and it was good! But at the end, it felt rushed. She dropped a "my friends are Limbus Company now" randomly. She did not even interacted with anyone during the Dungeon. All the Sinners were just looking from far away like "go white girl go". She could have teamed up with them, she could have created bounds with them. All we got is Heathcliff saving her to make the Ishheath fans scream because Ishmael is a dark skinned himbo magnet.

I hope at least, Ishmael will play a really good part in Heathcliff's evolution in his Canto, the next one, but that's disappointing that during Ishmael's, it wasn't much. She could have got closer to Outis during the final fight, since both were already working as a team on the boat before, she could have got closer to Rodion, who helped her, or maybe Don! It's sad she was just, here, alone, against Ahab. It broke the whole purpose of "finding her new self", and she seemed that she came to this conclusion randomly.

So yup. Big disappointment. I probably set the bar of my expectations too high, maybe, but I'm not the only one sharing this, as I discuted it with some people before. I can complain about other points, like how Moby Dick just appeared for one scene, that Queequeg's death was absolutely useless to the story, or the lack of new abnormalities. But I'm being annoying.

Mili's song was fire tho, as always

[burningvelvet]

I finished Moby Dick. So, to continue my former post(s) documenting my thoughts, here we are (spoilers ahead):

captain ahab: i am once again asking hast thou seen the white whale

Narrator, for the 5 millionth time describing captain ahab: "MONOMANIACAL. MONOMANIAC. MONOMANIA."

I was thinking "the homosexual themes everyone talks about are really exaggerated apparently…" and then I got to the chapter about sperm squeezing

Stubb meeting with the French in chap 91 had the exact vibe of a filler episode on a comedy sitcom

there are a lot of moments that reminded me of The Office ngl like i could just imagine stubb in the little interview chair just talking. so much meme material. he's seriously just doing his own thing. the little random characters like the blacksmith and carpenter just talking shit and side-eyeing ahab in the background lmaoooo

Saint George didn't kill a dragon, it was a whale #THETRUTHREVEALED #WHALETRUTHERS

It would have been hilarious if the British people told Ahab that they already killed Moby Dick already before he could get to it. I was so hoping that would happen. Bonus points if it was the Rachel after he'd turned them away.

Ahab discusses the topic of madness a lot. It's almost like he's… mad...

I vote Ahab for the most Byronic hero to ever Byronic… Heathcliff and Rochester have nothing on him… The origin of the Byronic hero, Byron's titular character from the narrative poem Childe Harold, is literally mentioned by name in the novel and had to be a blatant inspiration - it could not be more obvious! (I have yet to encounter the famed Byronic heroes of Russian literature, most notably Eugene Onegin, a work where Byron is also blatantly name-dropped).

Everyone thinking Queequeg was dying and having a coffin made to his measurements and filled with grave goods at his direction and then him literally climbing into the coffin to test it out and then waiting silently to die…. then all of a sudden getting better and saying he chose to recover bc he remembered he had something on his to-do list….. iconic

Ishmael referring to Queequeg as "my Queequeg…" omg. Queerqueg

Queequeg drawing figures like the ones on his tattoos omg… au story where Queequeg is an artist/tattoo artist when???

I was literally saying "AWWWWW" out loud when Ahab and Pip were having their little moments

The irony of Ahab abandoning the Rachel then it coming back for Ishmael… the coffin lifeboat… etc… good stuff…

okay ahab is my man but yeah he was an asshole to the captain of rachel.

also feel bad for tashtego. he wanted that gold doubloon so bad and ahab was like SIKE, MOTHERFUCKER! umm tashtego did not get cut out of a whale by queequeg to deal with ur shit ahab!

Once again wanting a Black Sails/Moby Dick AU… I found this essay about the similarities between Flint/Ahab https://ijms.nmdl.org/article/view/22389/14361

They only have like 2-3 little moments together but like… Starbuck/Ahab kind of outdoing Ishmael/Queequeg there for a moment… chaps 132/134… oh my godddddddddddddd whyyyyyyy

Captain Ahab's moments in chapters 36/37 AAAAAHHHHH you will see me being normal about this

I noted some of my favorite Ahab moments/chapters and they are 36/37/41/70/99/108/109/113/115/116/119/125/129/132/134/135. Like I may seriously just re-read those chapters (no offense to Melville's whale facts, Stubb's jokes, & Pip's insanity)

the end is kind of similar to the great gatsby in the sense that you finally realize the entire novel was actually written for him to cope with his grief-related trauma & then suddenly it all makes sense. the lingering, the sentimentality regarding seemingly insignificant details or people, the meandering/digressing/procrastinating getting to the end, etc.

there are actually several moments -- i don't know if he actually referred to ahab or the others in past-tense specifically, but there were several moments where i felt like i kind of thought he was giving away the end before he did (it wasn't a shock to me bc i read about the end prior, but still)

[brokenhandsmedia]

Some book reviews for a difficult time in the year. There aren't that many on here, but I tackled two Tumblr favorites: House of Leaves and Moby Dick.

For the latter, I honestly think that, for the time, the whale science was fine? This came out roughly contemporaneously with The Origin of Species and we all know now that there's no such thing as a fish, so quit being weird. Ishmael is trying his best.

[wakingfromthewater]

My work bestie is apoplectic about this revocation of birthright citizenship thing. I have heard about it five times since yesterday and at this rate I think it's going to be added to his menu of conversation topics.

[llycaons]

it's already 2pm omg...

[weneedtotalkaboutbooks]

Moby Dick by Herman Melville [A Review]

A candidate for the 'Great American Novel' this review of Moby Dick explores the key elements, themes and innovations that have made it an enduring classic.

Herman Melville’s Moby Dick has come from an inauspicious beginning to being considered a ‘great American novel’. Its nod to gothic romantic fiction, intriguing plot setup and iconic characters promise a dark adventure into the unknown. But modern readers might struggle with the novel’s length, uneven pace and many diversions. Instead, Moby Dick’s greater legacy may lie in its innovations in form…