Many are familiar with the story of Ishmael, Queequeg, Captain Ahab and the infamous white whale. Some can even recite the first line, “Call me Ishmael.” The story is commonly cited as the Great American Novel, said to personify America. The book is iconic, and even those who haven’t read the story itself may know the gist of the plot.

As a kid, inspired by Matilda to read the thickest book I could get my hands on, I asked my dad if he could read me Moby-Dick. At first, he laughed, but after I begged him each night for a few days he relented. I hated it by the second page, so our copy of Moby-Dick returned to the bookshelf, and my dad and I reading the book together became a running joke. That is, until this summer. As quarantine began, and my family quickly ran out of things to do while remaining socially distant, we decided to pick up Herman Melville’s 585-page, 206,052-word masterpiece once again. Taking turns reading, we slowly made our way through the story, enjoying the annotations my mother had written in her copy during her English major days in college. Although we have not quite finished it due to being fairly busy and the length of the novel, I feel that having been exposed to a significant portion, I am qualified to tell you what you should know before attempting to read Moby-Dick, should you ever have the urge. 

Right off the bat, you should be expecting some long monologues on a seemingly irrelevant subject that may never come up again. Like it or not, by the time you finish this book, you will have gained knowledge on a variety of topics including cetology, the history of Cape Cod and the surrounding areas and why an animal being white makes them more ominous. I would say that a third of this book is the plot, a third is various aspects of whaling and sailing and the final third of the book is just Melville talking about some obscure point. As my father said, “no thread is left untugged,” which was one reason that Melville’s other works were nowhere near as successful; they were almost illegible and it was difficult to glean any sense of plot due to the amount that Melville would explain every fine detail. 

Something a reader will no doubt discover is that the plot does not move fast. This might be something a potential reader could assume, but I’m including it anyway as a warning: this book requires time and patience. It is roughly on page 100 that the Pequod (the ship on which Ahab, Ishmael, Queequeg and the rest of the cast sail) leaves the harbor. The slow pace of the book can be attributed to Melville’s aforementioned tendencies to explicate every last detail. Still, the pace becomes tolerable as you continue to read and adds an extra element of excitement when you reach one of the iconic parts of the book, such as when Ahab nails the doubloon to the mainmast. 

Finally, despite its shortcomings and occasionally confusing style of writing, this book is an amazing read. It isn’t called the Great American Novel for nothing. The story is engaging, the characters are complex and the subject matter is interesting, not to mention the amount of bragging rights that come with having finished it. A sense of accomplishment and pride comes from having made it through the entirety of this iconic book. Moby-Dick is a journey of a read for sure, but it’s one worth taking.