Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
The Prosthetic Arts of Moby-Dick

The Prosthetic Arts of Moby-Dick

Blake, David Haven

Hardcover

Literary Criticism

ISBN10: 0197780512
ISBN13: 9780197780510
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: Nov 29 2024
Pages: 256
Weight: 1.06
Height: 1.03 Width: 6.50 Depth: 9.41
Language: English
The Prosthetic Arts of Moby-Dick offers the first book-length study of how physical disability shapes one of the world's most iconic novels. For generations, readers have viewed Captain Ahab's whalebone leg as a symbol of what he lacks, the limb he lost while fighting the white whale off the coast of Japan. David Haven Blake considers that ivory leg in a historical, medical, and geo-political context. Drawing on extensive archival research, he situates Ahab's prosthesis at the center of the novel's reflections on wounding, embodiment, and the role that Islamic cultures play in American narratives of revenge.

Melville had a lifelong fascination with dismemberment. From the use of assistive devices to the phenomenon of phantom limbs, he keenly imagined the experience of disability on ship. Blake connects the novel's interest in prostheses with its use of Islamic imagery to characterize overwhelming power. In this radically new analysis, he identifies the character Fedallah as the captain's most important prosthesis in piloting the captain to his final battle with Moby Dick. A key to understanding both Ahab and Ishmael, Fedallah emerges as the crutch upon which this novel of dismemberment leans.

Engagingly written and spanning each stage of Melville's career, The Prosthetic Arts of Moby-Dick is an eye-opening meditation on democracy, aggrievement, and the challenges of living in a global age.

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