i202 Fall 2010 School of Information, UC Berkeley

I. Screw Science 

Is a whale a fish? Absolutely!  Ishmael or the narrator or perhaps even Melville* decides to disagree with Linnaeus’ assertion that the whale is not a fish but a mammal. The narrator quips, “But of my own knowledge, I know that down to the year 1850, sharks and shad, alewives and herring, against Linnaeus's express edict, were still found dividing the possession of the same seas with the Leviathan.” 

*It’s unclear whether this chapter is a break altogether from the narrative, Melville was a whaler while this is Ishmael’s first whaling trip.

II. Don’t Alienate Your Audience

The narrator does, however, admit that whales are mammals and that they have lungs, not gills. That is, if that’s alright with Nantucket.

By the above definition of what a whale is, I do by no means exclude from the leviathanic brotherhood any sea creature hitherto identified with the whale by the best informed Nantucketers; nor, on the other hand, link with it any fish hitherto authoritatively regarded as alien.

Perhaps you remember the hullabaloo when Jupiter was demoted form planet to trans-Neptunian object?  People are touchy about change, and being politic is an inherent part of classification. Here, our narrator makes a point not to unsettle an important whaling constituency. 

III. Categorize What You Know

The narrator selects very literary categories. Whales are divided into three books that are then further divided into chapters.  The books are The Folio Whale, The Octavio Whale, and The Duodecimo Whale.  Folio, octavo, and duodecimo are book sizes.  A folio is the largest size (and thus describes the largest whales), where two pages are printed on both the front of back of a piece of paper, and the paper is then folded in half to make four pages.  The octavo creates 16 pages per sheet, and the duodecimo produces 24 per sheet.

 IV. The Fourth Dimension

Time is of the essence. (This may also fall under the purview of ‘consider your audience.’) For many of the whales, Melville notes the quality of their oil for light. Imagine finding the following passage in any modern encyclopedic entry on a whale:

When not more profitably employed, the sperm whale hunters sometimes capture the Hyena whale, to keep up the supply of cheap oil for domestic employment- as some frugal housekeepers, in the absence of company, and quite alone by themselves, burn unsavory tallow instead of odorous wax. Though their blubber is very thin, some of these whales will yield you upwards of thirty gallons of oil. 

Or perhaps the following:

Porpoise meat is good eating, you know.

V. Make Vulgar Jokes

If possible make these jokes about royalty. The following is from the narrator’s description of the narwhal.  A whale with a long horn as pictured.

Black Letter tells me that Sir Martin Frobisher on his return from that voyage, when Queen Bess did gallantly wave her jewelled hand to him from a window of Greenwich Palace, as his bold ship sailed down the Thames; "when Sir Martin returned from that voyage," saith Black Letter, "on bended knees he presented to her highness a prodigious long horn of the Narwhale, which for a long period after hung in the castle at Windsor." An Irish author avers that the Earl of Leicester, on bended knees, did likewise present to her highness another horn, pertaining to a land beast of the unicorn nature. 

VI.  Be As Arbitrary As Possible

The narrator decides to name a porpoise that he describes as being common across the globe the Huzzah porpoise and gives the following explanation:

The name is of my own bestowal; for there are more than one sort of porpoises, and something must be done to distinguish them. I call him thus, because he always swims in hilarious shoals, which upon the broad sea keep tossing themselves to heaven like caps in a Fourth-of-July crowd.

VII. Make Your System Scalable

You never know what has yet to be discovered. The narrator’s system  ends with the duodecimo whales; however, he assures the reader that, “If any of the following whales, shall hereafter be caught and marked, then he can readily be incorporated into this System, according to his Folio, Octavo, or Duodecimo magnitude:- The Bottle-Nose Whale; the Junk Whale; the Pudding-Headed Whale... From Icelandic, Dutch, and old English authorities, there might be quoted other lists of uncertain whales, blessed with all manner of uncouth names."

VIII. Nothing Is Ever Finished

For small erections may be finished by their first architects; grand ones, true ones, ever leave the copestone to posterity. God keep me from ever completing anything. This whole book is but a  draught- nay, but the draught of a draught. Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience! 

Amen.