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Front Matter and Excerpts
Chapter I - Loomings
Chapter II - The Carpet-Bag
Chapter III - The Spouter-Inn
Chapter IV - The Counterpane
Chapter V - Breakfast
Chapter VI - The Street
Chapter VII - The Chapel
Chapter VIII - The Pulpit
Chapter IX - The Sermon
Chapter X - A Bosom Friend
Chapter XI - Nightgown
Chapter XII - Biographical
Chapter XIII - Wheelbarrow
Chapter XIV - Nantucket
Chapter XV - Chowder
Chapter XVI - The Ship
Chapter XVII - The Ramadan
Chapter XVIII - His Mark
Chapter XIX - The Prophet
Chapter XX - All Astir
Chapter XXI - Going Aboard
Chapter XXII - Merry Christmas
Chapter XXIII - The Lee Shore
Chapter XXIV - The Advocate
Chapter XXV - Postscript
Chapter XXVI - Knights And Squires
Chapter XXVII - Knights And Squires
Chapter XXVIII - Ahab
Chapter XXIX - Enter Ahab; To Him, Stubb
Chapter XXX - The Pipe
Chapter XXXI - Queen Mab
Chapter XXXII - Cetology
Chapter XXXIII - The Specksynder
Chapter XXXIV - The Cabin-Table
Chapter XXXV - The Mast-Head
Chapter XXXVI - The Quarter-Deck
Chapter XXXVII - Sunset
Chapter XXXVIII - Dusk
Chapter XXXIX - First Night-Watch
Chapter XL - Midnight, Forecastle
Chapter XLI - Moby Dick
Chapter XLII - The Whiteness of the Whale
Chapter XLIII - Hark!
Chapter XLIV - The Chart
Chapter XLV - The Affidavit
Chapter XLVI - Surmises
Chapter XLVII - The Mat-Maker
Chapter XLVIII - The First Lowering
Chapter XLIX - The Hyena
Chapter L - Ahab's Boat and Crew. Fedallah
Chapter LI - The Spirit-Spout
Chapter LII - The Albatross
Chapter LIII - The Gam
Chapter LIV - The Town-Ho's Story
Chapter LV - Of the Monstrous
Pictures of Whales
Chapter LVI - Of the Less Erroneous
Pictures of Whales,
and the True Pictures of Whaling Scenes
Chapter LVII - Of Whales in Paint; in Teeth; in Wood;
in Sheet-Iron; in Stone; in Mountains; in Stars
Chapter LVIII - Brit
Chapter LIX - Squid
Chapter LX - The Line
Chapter LXI - Stubb Kills A Whale
Chapter LXII - The Dart
Chapter LXIII - The Crotch
Chapter LXIV - Stubb's Supper
Chapter LXV - The Whale as a Dish
Chapter LXVI - The Shark Massacre
Chapter LXVII - Cutting In
Chapter LXVIII - The Blanket
Chapter LXIX - The Funeral
Chapter LXX - The Sphynx
Chapter LXXI - The Jeroboam's Story
Chapter LXXII - The Monkey Rope
Chapter LXXIII - Stubb and Flask Kill a Right Whale; and Then Have a Talk Over Him
Chapter LXXIV - The Sperm Whale's Head—Contrasted View
Chapter LXXV - The Right Whale's Head—Contrasted View
Chapter LXXVI - The Battering-Ram
Chapter LXXVII - The Great Heidelburgh Tun
Chapter LXXVIII - Cistern and Buckets
Chapter LXXIX - The Prairie
Chapter LXXX - The Nut
Chapter LXXXI - The Pequod Meets the Virgin
Chapter LXXXII - The Honor and Glory of Whaling
Chapter LXXXIII - Jonah Historically Regarded
Chapter LXXXIV - Pitchpoling
Chapter LXXXV - The Fountain
Chapter LXXXVI - The Tail
Chapter LXXXVII - The Grand Armada
Chapter LXXXVIII - Schools and Schoolmasters
Chapter LXXXIX - Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish
Chapter XC - Heads or Tails
Chapter XCI - The Pequod Meets
the Rose-Bud
Chapter XCII - Ambergris
Chapter XCIII - The Castaway
Chapter XCIV - A Squeeze of the Hand
Chapter XCV - The Cassock
Chapter XCVI - The Try-Works
Chapter XCVII - The Lamp
Chapter XCVIII - Stowing Down
and Clearing Up
Chapter XCIX - The Doubloon
Chapter C - Leg and Arm: The Pequod, of Nantucket, Meets the Samuel Enderby, Of London
Chapter CI - The Decanter
Chapter CII - A Bower in the Arsacides
Chapter CIII - Measurement of the Whale's Skeleton
Chapter CIV - The Fossil Whale
Chapter CV - Does the Whale's Magnitude
Diminish?—Will he Perish?
Chapter CVI - Ahab's Leg
Chapter CVII - The Carpenter
Chapter CVIII - Ahab and the Carpenter
Chapter CIX - Ahab and Starbuck in the Cabin
Chapter CX - Queequeg in his Coffin
Chapter CXI - The Pacific
Chapter CXII - The Blacksmith
Chapter CXIII - The Forge
Chapter CXIV - The Gilder
Chapter CXV - The Pequod Meets The Bachelor
Chapter CXVI - The Dying Whale
Chapter CXVII - The Whale Watch
Chapter CXVIII - The Quadrant
Chapter CXIX - The Candles
Chapter CXX - The Deck Towards the End of
the First Night Watch
Chapter CXXI - Midnight—The Forecastle Bulwarks
Chapter CXXII - Midnight Aloft—Thunder and Lightning
Chapter CXXIII - The Musket
Chapter CXXIV - The Needle
Chapter CXXV - The Log and Line
Chapter CXXVI - The Life-Buoy
Chapter CXXVII - The Deck
Chapter CXXVIII - The Pequod Meets
the Rachel
Chapter CXXIX - The Cabin
Chapter CXXX - The Hat
Chapter CXXXI - The Pequod Meets
the Delight
Chapter CXXXII - The Symphony
Chapter CXXXIII - The Chase—First Day
Chapter CXXXIV - The Chase—Second Day
Chapter CXXXV - The Chase—Third Day
Epilogue
* * *
Main sources used
A note on the text
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Moby-Dick by Herman Melville is in the public domain.
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Cultural Fallout
of the Week:
Jack Murnighan's new book Beowulf on the Beach: What to Love and What to Skip in Literature's 50 Greatest Hits calls Moby-Dick "one of the funniest books of all time." Read the whole Moby-Dick chapter free.
Illustrator Doug Williams's "Little Red Riding Hood" mashup, Moby Wolf
Movie trailer: The Pequod vs. Das Boot
Washington State's Moby Dick Oyster Farm wins the right to whack weeds with weed whackers
Upcoming and Ongoing:
Artist Tristin Lowe's life-sized felt "Mocha Dick" on display all summer at Philadelphia's Fabric Workshop and Museum
Vote for Moby Dick for "best performance by an animal" in this Guardian literary poll thru July 10.
Moby Dick: Heart of the Sea, works by George Klauba, Kathleen Piercefield, and Robert McCauley, at Rockford (IL) Art Museum thru Jul 5.
An exhibit of fine art by the late Disney animator Marc Davis includes a cubist Moby Dick. Forest Lawn Museum, Glendale, California, through Jul 26.
Stay overnight on America's last wooden whaleship during the Jul 31 Moby-Dick marathon in Mystic, Connecticut.
Guy Ben-Ner's home-movie version is showing at the Indianapolis Museum of Art thru Aug 16. (It's also viewable online.)
Prior Cultural Fallout:
Teenage handcrafter WhatsEatinYou's crocheted Moby Dick hat complete with harpoons
Blogger Paxton Holley envisions Moby Dick with death-laser eye
Johnson County (KS) Library courier truck decorated as Captain Ahab's Fine Seafood vehicle
Reporter to Pierce Brosnan: "Should we ban Moby-Dick?
Hudson Valley (NY) Film Commission casts benefit guests in a film remake of Moby-Dick
Woody Allen's "The Whore of Mensa": "Fifty, maybe a hundred" dollars to discuss Moby-Dick
Theater Waidspeicher of Erfurt, Germany, premiered a puppet version of Moby-Dick. (Link in German.)
Onion Radio News: "Ahab decides to 'let it go.'" (Link makes noise.)
New Bedford fifth-graders write Moby-Dick from the whale's point-of-view. Backstory on Moby Monday.
Moby Dick's Guide to Dating at Sea part of the insta-book Book: The Sequel
The title character maps Moby-Dick in The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet
Bernard Herrmann's Moby Dick cantata
Moby Rich, novelist Nicole Galland's "modern riff on Moby-Dick," was serialized in the (Martha's) Vineyard Gazette.
Gare St. Lazare's one-man adaptation performed by Conor Lovett
A beer commercial once voted "the best ad of all time" took inspiration from Moby-Dick
Bankshot Comics's new gender-bending "Hollywood Garbage" version. (Link includes adult situations.)