WoohoooFinal

Argument:
The novel Moby Dick, although written by anti-transcendentalist Herman Melville, still uses the idea that humans, as part of this divine world, are omnipotent. Ahab would be the protagonist for this thought as well as a parallel to what might happen to the United States if they continue to bend this ideal. Ahab is considered the ruling body or government and the other men on the ship would represent all the different social classes, and common people. As Ahab continues to try and kill the white whale he is twisting the perfect model of this divine world and breaking the bond which holds man close to nature. While not only bringing himself down but bringing the ship itself and its men to a chaotic end. In comparison the United States government is just as much creating a curvature in this principle, by using its powers to do things the people of America don’t all agree on, so just as we see Ahab fail we will see the United States have the same devastating end.

Analysis:
Herman Melville’s, Moby Dick Tests the perfect model created by transcendentalist. The idea that men are divine in this world is shown at an extreme in Captain Ahab. Ahab has an obsession with coming to an encounter with the behemoth, as he refers to it, who took his leg. Many on the ship can see Ahab’s obsession and try to make him give it up but Ahab is determined to show everyone he is "God" of the ship and because he is, he can defeat anything.

Ahab as captain of the ship tries to show great strength and fear of nothing. We see this in scene one of our film, Ahab is told be Starbuck that there is danger ahead and that some of his men are at danger. Ahab strikes back by saying that he is who he is and that he should not turn away from any obstacle in his way. Ahab thinks he is all powerful and cannot be defeated by anything or anyone. He begins his obsessive pursuit for the white whale and everyone one on the ship can see no good is going to come from it.

In our second scene Starbuck is trying to make Ahab give up his crazy pursuit for the white whale. Ahab tells Starbuck that he is a coward for not wanting to encounter Moby Dick, But Starbuck tries to reason and say that eh would be willing to die if he knew that that encounter was going to be worth something in the market but he’s telling him that even if they did kill the white whale it would be seen as much in the market. Ahab completely refuses to understand where Starbuck is coming from and tells him that the market does not matter to him, all that matters to him is encountering the behemoth who took is leg. The further the trip is taken the more Starbuck's anger grows; he begins to hate Ahab and his vengeful mind.

The third scene continues with Starbuck telling Ahab that there is an oil leak and that they need to up burtons but Ahab refuses, all he could think of was how far they had come and how close they were to meeting with the white whale. Starbuck gets really mad and starts telling him again that his trip for revenge is meaningless and will only lead to something bad. Ahab gets offended and so walked over to grab his musket and starts pointing it at Starbuck saying,” There is one God that is Lord over the earth, and one Captain that is lord over the Pequod.” Ahab goes out to the deck and as he is beginning to give orders a shipmate tells him not to beware of Starbuck but that Ahab Beware of Ahab. Ahab thought of what the shipmate said and so he tells them to up burtons. Although Ahab thought about what he was doing in that moment, he still continues his pursuit for the white whale. When he finally encounters the white whale it is like something inside of Ahab is revealed he cannot stop himself although he sees the misfortune he is bringing all the men.

Scripts:
__**Scene 1:**__ //Ahab standing by the helm. Starbuck approaching him.//

__Starbuck:__"We must send down the main-top-sail yard, Sir. The band is working loose, and the lee lift is half-stranded. Shall I strike it, Sir?"

__Ahab:__"Strike nothing; lash it. If I had sky-sail poles, I'd sway them up now."

__Starbuck:__"Sir? - in God's name! - Sir?" "Well." "The anchors are working, Sir. Shall I get them inboard?"

__Ahab:__"Strike nothing, and stir nothing, but lash everything. The wind rises, but it has not got up to my table-lands yet. Quick, and see to it. - By masts and keels! he takes me for the hunch-backed skipper of some coasting smack. Send down my main-top-sail yard! Ho, gluepots! Loftiest trucks were made for wildest winds, and this brain-truck of mine now sails amid the cloud-scud. Shall I strike that? Oh, none but cowards send down their brain-trucks in tempest time. What a hooroosh aloft there! I would e'en take it for sublime, did I not know that the colic is a noisy malady. Oh, take medicine, take medicine!"


 * __Scene 2:__**

__Starbuck__: "Captain Ahab," “Captain Ahab, I have heard of Moby Dick - but it was not Moby Dick that took off thy leg?"

__Captain Ahab:__ "Who told thee that?" "Aye, Starbuck; aye, my hearties all round; it was Moby Dick that dismasted me; Moby Dick that brought me to this dead stump I stand on now. Aye, aye," he shouted with a terrific, loud, animal sob, like that of a heart-stricken moose; "Aye, aye! it was that accursed white whale that razeed me; made a poor pegging lubber of me for ever and a day!" "Aye, aye! and I'll chase him round Good Hope, and round the horn, and round the norway maelstrom, and round perdition's flames before I give him up. And this is what ye have shipped for, men! to chase that white whale on both sides of land, and over all sides of earth, till he spouts black blood and rolls fin out. What say ye, men, will ye splice hands on it, now? I think ye do look brave."

__Crew__: "Aye, aye!" "A sharp eye for the White Whale; a sharp lance for Moby Dick!"

__Captain Ahab:__ "God bless ye," "God bless ye, men. Steward! go draw the great measure of grog. But what's this long face about, Mr. Starbuck; wilt thou not chase the white whale? art not game for Moby Dick?"

__Starbuck:__ "I am game for his crooked jaw, and for the jaws of Death too, Captain Ahab, if it fairly comes in the way of the business we follow; but I came here to hunt whales, not my commander's vengeance. How many barrels will thy vengeance yield thee even if thou gettest it, Captain Ahab? it will not fetch thee much in our Nantucket market."

__Captain Ahab:__ "Nantucket market! Hoot! But come closer, Starbuck; thou requirest a little lower layer. If money's to be the measurer, man, and the accountants have computed their great counting-house the globe, by girdling it with guineas, one to every three parts of an inch; then, let me tell thee, that my vengeance will fetch a great premium here!"


 * __Scene 3:__**

//Now, from the South and West the Pequod was drawing nigh to Formosa and the Bashee Isles, between which lies one of the tropical outlets from the China waters into the Pacific. And so Starbuck found Ahab with a general chart of the oriental archipelagoes spread before him; and another separate one representing the long eastern coasts of the Japanese islands - Niphon, Matsmai, and Sikoke. With his snow-white new ivory leg braced against the screwed leg of his table, and with a long pruning-hook of a jack-knife in his hand, the wondrous old man, with his back to the gangway door, was wrinkling his brow, and tracing his old courses again.//

__Ahab:__"Who's there?" hearing the footstep at the door, but not turning round to it. "On deck! Begone!"

__Starbuck:__"Captain Ahab mistakes; it is I. The oil in the hold is leaking, Sir. We must up Burtons and break out."

__Ahab:__"Up Burtons and break out? Now that we are nearing Japan; heave-to here for a week to tinker a parcel of old hoops?"

__Starbuck:__"Either do that, Sir, or waste in one day more oil than we may make good in a year. What we come twenty thousand miles to get is worth saving, Sir."

__Ahab:__"So it is, so it is; if we get it."

__Starbuck:__"I was speaking of the oil in the hold, Sir."

__Ahab:__"And I was not speaking or thinking of that at all. Begone! Let it leak! I'm all aleak myself. Aye! leaks in leaks! not only full of leaky casks, but those leaky casks are in a leaky ship; and that's a far worse plight than the Pequod's, man. Yet I don't stop to plug my leak; for who can find it in the deep-loaded hull; or how hope to plug it, even if found, in this life's howling gale? Starbuck! I'll not have the Burtons hoisted."

__Starbuck:__"What will the owners say, Sir?"

__Ahab:__"Let the owners stand on Nantucket beach and outyell the Typhoons. What cares Ahab? Owners, owners? Thou art always prating to me, Starbuck, about those miserly owners, as if the owners were my conscience. But look ye, the only real owner of anything is its commander; and hark ye, my conscience is in this ship's keel. - On deck!"

//"Captain Ahab," said the reddening mate, moving further into the cabin, with a daring so strangely respectful and cautious that it almost seemed not only every way seeking to avoid the slightest outward manifestation of itself, but within also seemed more than half distrustful of itself; "A better man than I might well pass over in thee what he would quickly enough resent in a younger man; aye! and in a happier, Captain Ahab."//

__Ahab:__"Devils! Dost thou then so much as dare to critically think of me? - On deck!"

__Starbuck:__"Nay, Sir, not yet; I do entreat. And I do dare, Sir - to be forbearing! Shall we not understand each other better than hitherto, Captain Ahab?" //Ahab seized a loaded musket from the rack (forming part of most South-Sea-men's cabin furniture), and pointing it towards Starbuck, exclaimed://

__Ahab:__"There is one God that is Lord over the earth, and one Captain that is lord over the Pequod. - On deck!"

//For an instant in the flashing eyes of the mate, and his fiery cheeks, you would have almost thought that he had really received the blaze of the levelled tube. But, mastering his emotion, he half calmly rose, and as he quitted the cabin, paused for an instant and said://

__Shipmate:__"Thou hast outraged, not insulted me, Sir; but for that I ask thee not to beware of Starbuck; thou wouldst but laugh; but let Ahab beware of Ahab; beware of thyself, old man."

__Ahab:__"He waxes brave, but nevertheless obeys; most careful bravery that!" //murmured Ahab, as Starbuck disappeared.//

__Ahab:__"What's that he said - Ahab beware of Ahab - there's something there!"

//Then unconsciously using the musket for a staff, with an iron brow he paced to and fro in the little cabin; but presently the thick plaits of his forehead relaxed, and returning the gun to the rack, he went to the deck.//

__Ahab:__"Thou art but too good a fellow, Starbuck," //he said lowly to the mate; then raising his voice to the crew:// "Furl the t'gallant-sails and close-reef the top-sails, fore and aft; back the main-yard; up Burtons, and break out in the main- hold."

//It were perhaps vain to surmise exactly why it was, that as respecting Starbuck, Ahab thus acted. It may have been a flash of honesty in him; or mere prudential policy which, under the circumstance, imperiously forbade the slightest symptom of open disaffection, however transient, in the important chief officer of his ship. However it was, his orders were executed; and the Burtons were hoisted. In Sperm-whalemen with any considerable quantity of oil on board, it is a regular semi-weekly duty to conduct a hose into the hold, and drench the casks with sea-water; which afterwards, at varying intervals, is removed by the ship's pumps. Hereby the casks are sought to be kept damply tight; while by the changed character of the withdrawn water, the mariners readily detect any serious leakage in the precious cargo.//