CAPTAIN AHAB
AS SEEN IN:
"Moby Dick" (2010)
"Moby Dick" (2010)
AS PLAYED BY:
William Hurt
TV DIMENSION:
Land of Remakes
STATUS:
Recastaway
CAPTAIN AHAB
AS SEEN IN:
"Moby Dick" (1998)
AS PLAYED BY:
Patrick Stewart
TV DIMENSION:
Earth Prime-Time
STATUS:
Original Televersion
CREATED BY:
Herman Melville
From Wikipedia:
Ahab is the tyrannical captain of the Pequod who is driven by a
monomaniacal desire to kill Moby Dick, the whale that maimed him on the previous
whaling voyage. Although he is a Quaker, he seeks revenge in defiance of his
religion's well-known pacifism. Ahab's Biblical namesake is the evil
idol-worshipping ruler in the Book of Kings, and this association prompts
Ishmael to ask, at his first encounter with Ahab:
"When that wicked king was slain, the dogs, did they not lick his blood?".
—Moby-Dick, Ch. 16
When Ishmael remarks upon the ill associations of such a name, he is rebuked by one of Ahab's colleagues, who points out that "He did not name himself!"Little information is provided about Ahab's life prior to meeting Moby Dick, although it is known that he was orphaned at a young age. When discussing the purpose of his quest with Starbuck, it is revealed that he first began whaling at eighteen and has continued in the trade for forty years, having spent less than three on land. He also mentions his "girl-wife," whom he married late in life, and their young son, but does not give their names.Ahab ultimately dooms the crew of the Pequod (save for Ishmael) to death by his obsession with Moby Dick. During the final chase, Ahab hurls his last harpoon while yelling his now-famous revenge line:
"When that wicked king was slain, the dogs, did they not lick his blood?".
—Moby-Dick, Ch. 16
When Ishmael remarks upon the ill associations of such a name, he is rebuked by one of Ahab's colleagues, who points out that "He did not name himself!"Little information is provided about Ahab's life prior to meeting Moby Dick, although it is known that he was orphaned at a young age. When discussing the purpose of his quest with Starbuck, it is revealed that he first began whaling at eighteen and has continued in the trade for forty years, having spent less than three on land. He also mentions his "girl-wife," whom he married late in life, and their young son, but does not give their names.Ahab ultimately dooms the crew of the Pequod (save for Ishmael) to death by his obsession with Moby Dick. During the final chase, Ahab hurls his last harpoon while yelling his now-famous revenge line:
... to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for
hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.
—Moby-Dick, Ch. 135
The harpoon becomes lodged in Moby Dick's flesh and Ahab, caught around the neck by a loop in his own harpoon's rope and unable to free himself, is dragged down into the cold oblivion of the sea by the injured whale. The mechanics of Ahab's death are richly symbolic. He is killed by his own harpoon, a victim of his own twisted obsession and desire for revenge. The whale eventually destroys the whaleboats and crew, and sinks the Pequod.
—Moby-Dick, Ch. 135
The harpoon becomes lodged in Moby Dick's flesh and Ahab, caught around the neck by a loop in his own harpoon's rope and unable to free himself, is dragged down into the cold oblivion of the sea by the injured whale. The mechanics of Ahab's death are richly symbolic. He is killed by his own harpoon, a victim of his own twisted obsession and desire for revenge. The whale eventually destroys the whaleboats and crew, and sinks the Pequod.
From the source:
The White Whale swam before him as the monomaniac incarnation of all those
malicious agencies which some deep men feel eating in them, till they are left
living on with half a heart and half a lung. That intangible malignity which has
been from the beginning; to whose dominion even the modern Christians ascribe
one-half of the worlds; which the ancient Ophites of the east reverenced in
their statue devil; -- Ahab did not fall down and worship it like them; but
deliriously transferring its idea to the abhorred white whale, he pitted
himself, all mutilated, against it. All that most maddens and torments; all that
stirs up the lees of things; all truth with malice in it; all that cracks the
sinews and cakes the brain; all the subtle demonisms of life and thought; all
evil, to crazy Ahab, were visibly personified, and made practically assailable
in Moby Dick. He piled upon the whale's white hump the sum of all the general
rage and hate felt by his whole race from Adam down; and then, as if his chest
had been a mortar, he burst his hot heart's shell upon it.
—Moby-Dick, Ch.
41
Two for Tuesday!
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