Moby-Dick is a novel written in 1851 during the period of American Renaissance by Herman Melville. When Pequod finally faced Moby-Dick, it ended with a tragic ending: leaving nothing behind but only Ishmael himself with the coffin life-buoy. Like how Cole mentioned during the Socratic seminar, the “Coffin itself is an irony.” That is because a coffin is an ideal symbol of death, which also served as a life-buoy to save Ishmael’s life.
The ending of Moby-Dick gives a sense of great mystery for the audience. Basically, everyone died except the whale and Ishmael. This leaves the question of “What happened to Moby Dick?” and “Why did the whale win?” After all, it implies that the Nature’s calm, impersonal character is invincible against the man’s frenetic selfishness and obsession for revenge. Additionally, “Why Ishmael?” During the first part of Socratic seminar, the class discussed why
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The word coffin was mentioned multiply in the story starting from the beginning of the story. Ishmael discusses how he feels depressed and finds himself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses. This illustrates Ishmael’s fate with a coffin. Perhaps he feels down seeing the coffins because it relates to death of his friend Queequeg and his crewmen. The coffin is first created for Queequeg when he was seriously ill. Yet, he quickly recovers. Queequeg then turns the coffin to a chest to store his belongings and carves the lid with his tattoos. There’s also another symbolism here. His tattoos present Queequeg’s personal background and story. When his coffin survived with Ishmael, it depicts Queequeg holding grudges in life. Overall, it was Queequeg who saved Ishmael’s life. This signify the relation between Ishmael and Queequeg like as if they were destined to be together from the start. Another interesting fact that Abdule pointed out in the Socratic seminar is that Peter “Coffin” is the one that brought them together at