The first go-round of Honors Am Lit I blog entries is underway.   Here are a few to check out:

Amanda noticed some irony:

One thing that Queequeg said that stood out to me had to do with his opinion of the “civilized” world. He had heard from a number of ships of the amazing religion of Christianity and the people in the other parts of the world. However, when he entered them, he saw that they were nothing better, if not worse, then the cannibals on his island. He said, “We cannibals must help these Christians.” I found this unbelievably ironic considering most people’s first impression of him.

Speaking of religion, I knew it was a good idea to have the class read “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” before this part of Moby-Dick.  Erin caught the contrast:

One of the quotes mentioned in this section that really sparked a thought in me was when one of the captains said, “It’s an all-fired outrage to tell any human creature that he’s bound to hell” (77). This reminded me so much of the article that we read called “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”. The whole thing was basically a lecture saying that you were bound to go to Hell unless you somehow proved to God that you were worthy of staying. It gave no hope to anyone that was not part of that religion, so it tried threatening readers into converting. The captain would definitely not have liked to read “Sinners” because I think he would have greatly disagreed.

There’s definitely a huge point of contrast between the religion of Jonathan Edwards and the more, shall we say, generous Christianity of Melville’s contemporaries.  Father Mapple formalizes it; Ishmael practices it.  It will be interesting to try and figure out where that difference comes from.

One last thing.  Hayden noticed a wee bit of foreshadowing:

The quote “A Coffin my Inn-keeper upon landing in my first whaling port; tombstones staring at me in the whalemen’s chapel; and here a gallows! and a pair of prodigious black pots too!” really shows that the theme of death is following Ishmael and this upcoming voyage is going to be full of it.

Buckle up, shipmates.