Moby Dick

“I am half way in the work . . . It will be a strange sort of book, tho’, I fear; blubber is blubber you know; tho’ you might get oil out of it, the poetry runs as hard as sap from a frozen maple tree;—and to cool the thing up, one must needs throw in a little fancy, which from the nature of the thing, must be ungainly as the gambols of the whales themselves. Yet I mean to give the truth of the thing, spite of this.”

Herman Melville

Following the success of our first Moby Dick Afloat study in July 2025 (see our Gallery for more information), we are pleased to offer an nine-week online study of this extraordinary book in January 2026.

First published in 1851, Moby Dick ranks on almost any list as one of the greatest works in the English language. Its three famous opening words ‘Call me Ishmael . . .’ and the image of the one-legged Ahab in mad pursuit of the great white whale, have become cultural icons. This grand—and occasionally grandiose—tale of adventure unites the many voices of Herman Melville in a mongrel mix of epic poetry, Shakespearean tragedy, encyclopaedic cataloguing, biblical oratory and not a small dose of comedy. With Moby Dick, Melville presents an insightful study of obsession, madness and charismatic leadership that anticipates many of our contemporary conversations about democracy, cosmopolitanism, capitalism and environmentalism.

Toby Brothers has led studies of Moby Dick on land and at sea. She explains: “More than anything, this epic work is about what we can know and what exceeds our conscious knowledge and moves into the mystic space of awe. The whale, in Ishmael’s telling and in direct encounter, is unfathomable. In both size and inhabiting the massive space of the oceanic depths, it eludes human measurement and control. Although thousands of years of hunting and killing have seemingly tried to know the whale through destruction, it has somehow survived. Many readers who have joined previous Moby Dick studies have admitted to trying to read this vast and weird book and feeling they were bogged down in ‘all the whale talk’. Admittedly, there is a whole chapter dedicated to an attempt to order the whale through a taxonomy of various species, but once you understand that it is a humorous take on scientific attempts to reduce these magnificent mammals to a human scale, even this chapter becomes a pleasurable read. And, of course, Melville is doing so much more than detailing the encounter between hunter and whale, his book has been read as a barely submerged critique of slavery, of the colonial impulse, of white supremacy. Melville celebrates male relationships and intimacy and reminds us of how nature’s power can hypnotise – a lone sailor facing the midnight sea stares into his own soul in reflection of its depths. To quote from the book: ‘Anything down there about your souls?’”

In 2019 celebration of the 200th year since Herman Melville’s birth generated rich responses and reconsiderations of this amazing book. Philip Hoare (mentioned below as one of the curators of the Moby Dick Big Read project) writes on the importance of this work in our contemporary moment in this article Subversive, queer and terrifyingly relevant: Six reasons why Moby Dick is the novel for our times. 

“The book features gay marriage, hits out at slavery and imperialism and predicts the climate crisis – 200 years after the birth of its author, Herman Melville, it has never been more important.”

Philip Hoare

Artist Angela Cockayne and writer Philip Hoare convened and curated a unique whale symposium and exhibition at Peninsula Arts, the dedicated contemporary art space at Plymouth University. This grew into an extraordinary compilation of art and voices (Tilda Swinton, Stephen Fry and more) – The Moby Dick Big Read – to illuminate each chapter, inspiring and inspired by this vast book.

SALON DETAILS:

• Nine-meeting virtual study on Zoom starting 22 January 2026
• Thursday afternoons, 4.30-6.30 pm (UK time)
• Facilitated by Toby Brothers, Salon Director
• Recommended edition: Moby Dick (Norton Critical Edition, Third Edition 2018), by Herman Melville, edited by Herschel Parker; W.W. Norton & Co. ISBN-13: 978-0393285000
• Cost £360, includes opening notes and weekly preparatory notes

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REDUCED COSTS: we are committed to making our studies as affordable as possible. We have a fund in place to support anyone who would like to register for a study but finds the cost difficult to afford. We can’t promise to help, but please email us at litsalon@gmail.com in confidence if you would like to request a reduction in the cost of a study.