I’ve just finished reading Moby Dick, which I read as part of a Catherine Project seminar. It was very different to what I was expecting. I assumed it would be a straight-forward story about a young man on a whaling voyage captained by a man obsessed with getting revenge against a whale that took his leg. And while it was that, it was also a discussion on capitalism, the racial melting pot of America, and an exploration of the subject of ‘whales’ from many conceivable view-points: anatomical, how their social groups are formed, what they are worth from an economic standpoint, and who can claim legal ownership of them.
While reading this book, it clarified an idea that had been formulating in my mind since reading The Odyssey, again as part of a Catherine Group seminar. Certain characters are seen as less ‘civilized’ as others due to their consumption habits. One of the main examples of this is the Cyclops, who eats a large number of Odysseus’s crew. The poem states that the Cyclops is an uncivilized being, in part due to the society it is a part of, where there are no ‘laws’ as such, but where a man makes the rules for his household, and where the households live in harmony, due to an abundance of natural resources. Odysseus observes that there is an island close by that could be colonized by the cyclops, and the fact they chose not to adds to their barbarism. However, it is the consumption of men, and act close to cannibalism, that truly distinguishes the Cyclops as uncivilized.
In Moby Dick, there is a similar discussion of consumption and civility. Queequeg, a man who has come to the United States from an island nation, is called a ‘cannibal’ (although we are not provided with evidence of his cannibalism), and while his skills as a harpooner are respected, it is acknowledged that he is barbarian, due in part to his paganism, and in part due to his supposed consumption of human flesh. Indeed, when Captain Ahab ‘baptizes’ his harpoon which is meant to kill Moby Dick, he does it in the blood of ‘heathens’, cutting Queequeg and two other ‘pagan’ characters with the tip of the harpoon.
Moby Dick takes the the discussion of consumption further than The Odyssey, by not only matching the supposed consumption habits of the characters to their level of civility, but criticizing society as a whole for separating itself from its consumption. Whaling, represented as a dirty and bloody business, produced whale oil, which was used in candles and other products used daily by many people in 1850s America. Ismael, the book’s narrator, calls out the reader, a presumed consumer of these products, for ignoring the realities of how whale oil is produced.
While reading Moby Dick, I found myself musing on why it is important for people to understand how something is consumed. From a practical standpoint, maybe they will choose to consume more mindfully, but in most cases, people will not choose to abstain, or even cut down on their consumption in a meaningful way. I came to the conclusion that by forcing people to confront how the products they use came to be, it is narrowing the gap between the person creating the product, and the person consuming the product. There is mental separation that occurs when all you do is consume, that allows the consumer to assume they are better than the person doing the producing. When the reality of how what you use came to be is presented to you, it’s harder to pretend you are not part of the lifecycle of the product.
I think consumption will be a theme I come back to continuously during my journey with the Classics. It feels something that is both timeless and timely in its relevance.
Ex Libris Tulsi 