Great Works of English Literature: Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Welche Bücher haben die englischsprachige Literatur geprägt? Die Rubrik „Great Works of English Literature“ stellt einige der bekanntesten Werke vor. In der aktuellen Ausgabe der Read On begeben wir uns auf die Pequod und folgen Kapitän Ahab bei seiner wahnwitzigen Jagd auf den Wal Moby Dick. Lesen Sie hier einen Auszug aus dem Artikel über einen der großen amerikanischen Romane.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

The story about a man’s obsession with a whale is considered one of the great American novels.

By Siobhan Bruns

1                 “Call me Ishmael.” The first words of Moby Dick, written by Herman Melville and published in 1851, are among the most famous of English literature. Ishmael is a sailor and our narrator, who tells us about his experience on a whaling ship.

2                 The story begins with Ishmael going to Massachusetts, where the fishing and whaling industries are, to find work on a ship.

3                 The inn he stays at there is too full, so he has to share a bed with a Polynesian harpooner named Queequeg.

4                 At first, Queequeg’s strange ways and full-body tattoos shock Ishmael, but he soon realises that Queequeg is generous and kind. The two become friends and look for work together.

5                 They sign up for a three-year journey on a whaling ship called the Pequod. However, they don’t meet the ship’s captain, Ahab – a “grand, ungodly, god-like man”, others say – until they have already been many days at sea.

6                 When Ishmael finally sees Ahab, he notices he is a powerful, middle-aged man, with a large white scar running down the side of his body, “like a seam”. One of his legs is missing and has been replaced with a sperm whale’s jawbone, which has been polished a bright white.

7                 Ishmael comes to realise that the captain’s missing leg is the real reason for their journey. Rather than hunting whales for their oil to light homes or lubricate machinery, they are hunting for just one whale: Moby Dick.

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Vocabulary

0–3             obsession Besessenheit — to be considered … als … gelten — narrator Erzähler(in) — whaling ship Walfangschiff — inn Gasthaus — harpooner Harpunierer(in)

4–6             ways Angewohnheiten; Art — to sign up for s.th. für etw. anheuern — grand groß — ungodly gottlos — at sea auf See — scar Narbe — seam Naht — sperm whale Pottwal — jawbone Kieferknochen — to polish s.th. etw. polieren

7                   oil Tran — to lubricate s.th. etw. schmieren — machinery Maschinen

Bild: KI-generiert