Sample Essay On Cover Page

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago--never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off--then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me.
Melville, Herman. “Moby Dick or The Whale” Page 1. Kindle edition

Difficulty Essay

The opening paragraph of “Moby Dick or The Whale” by Herman Melville had me mesmerized. I just about understood the gist of the passage; the protagonist’s craving to go to sea. His reasons seemed intriguing but I could not understand the references. What did he mean by “driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation” “grim about the mouth””damp drizzly November in my soul” “hypos get such an upper hand of me”? (1)
Like T Lockhart in her dissertation “Revising the Essay: Intellectual Arenas and Hybrid Forms” has said “Understanding is the essay’s primary function” (4). About style of the essay she says readers can “change their relationship to difficulty from feeling inadequate to feeling as though they can productively work through challenging scripts” (32). Thus inspired I first started by finding out what “hypos” meant. It is an archaic word related to ‘melancholy’ now used as a prefix to denote ‘suppressed’. This made the picture a little clearer. Obviously Ishmael wishes to go to sea to escape depression. In those days the spleen was said to be linked to melancholic thoughts as well as the centre of blood production. So “driving off the spleen and regulating circulation probably means ‘getting rid of the blues’ and thereby stabilizing the blood circulation.
Ishmael feels his melancholic mood can actually push him to murdering people to rid himself of his frustration or kill himself with “pistol and ball.” So it is better he quietly sails off to the high seas. Here he uses the historical event of the Roman statesman Cato’s flamboyant suicide as a contrast to the lack of drama in his own life. The sea offers refuge not just to him but many men like him.
This fascination for water; be it the ocean, sea, lake, pond or waterfalls and references to it reoccurs throughout the first chapter. It is presented as the escape every man is looking for. Talking about the city of Manhattoes surrounded by wharfs he says “Look at the crowd of water-gazers there.”(2) In Whitehall you can find men after a whole day’s hard work “Posted like silent sentinels stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reverie.” (3) Maybe it’s the ships that attract them just like it does Ishmael “Tell me, does the magnetic virtue of the needles of the compasses of all those ships attract them thither?”(4) Later he goes on to ask the reader “Were Niagara but a cataract of sand, would you travel your thousand miles to see it.”(5)
Ishmael’s questions do not cease “Why is almost every robust healthy boy with a robust healthy soul in him, at some time or other crazy to go to sea?” (5-6) He constantly refers to mythology and history to make his point; Persians, Greeks even Narcissus.
We find reference to his feeling of tiredness and depression again on page 6 when he says “I am in the habit of going to sea whenever I begin to go hazy about the eyes, and begin to be over conscious of my lungs.” Ishmael’s desire to go to sea this time is inspired by his curiosity to see the great whale”in the wild conceits that swayed me to my purpose, two and two they floated into my inmost soul; endless processions of the whale”
The first paragraph’s importance lies in its ability to spark the interest of the reader to read further, understand Ishmael’s love for the sea and his desire to go whaling.

References from

Lockhart, Tara. “Revising the Essay: Intellectual Arenas and Hybrid Forms” Pittsburgh 2008
Melville, Herman. “Moby Dick or The Whale” Kindle edition