…alone on a starship 10,000 light years from home with all the books in the universe. And I would dress like Captain Ahab, and I would stride around the catwalks inside this echoing starship, and faithful robot slaves would bring me crumbling volumes of…

…so very early on, I got this idea that the surface of things is not where attention should rest, that you have to, as Ahab tells Starbucks in Moby Dick, you have to seek the little lower layer. And under the surface of things is another reality, a…

…Dick where Starbuck, the first mate, you remember wimpy little Starbuck. He stood for christian right reason. And he says to Captain Ahab to seek revenge on a dumb brute seems blasphemy. And Ahab says, blasphemy, Starbuck, speak not to me of blasphemy. I…

…Starbuck. He stood for christian right reason. And he says to Captain Ahab to seek revenge on a dumb brute seems blasphemy. And Ahab says, blasphemy, Starbuck, speak not to me of blasphemy. I would strike out the sun if it insulted me. For could it do…

…a dumb brute, cried Starbuck, that simply smote thee from blindest instinct. Madness. To be enraged with a dumb thing, Captain Ahab, seems blasphemy. And Ahab says, hark ye yet again. The little lower layer. All visible objects, man are but as pasteboard.…

…Starbuck, that simply smote thee from blindest instinct. Madness. To be enraged with a dumb thing, Captain Ahab, seems blasphemy. And Ahab says, hark ye yet again. The little lower layer. All visible objects, man are but as pasteboard. But in each event,…

…I mean, who cares? What difference does it make? I've always thought that the supreme expression of ego in western literature is Captain Ahab of Moby Dick. I mean, this is ego unchained, ego raised to the status of deity. It's a losing battle, but, well,…

…who represents christian right reason, says, they're talking about Moby Dick. And he takes the animal rights position, and he says to Ahab, he says, captain, to seek revenge on a dumb brute seems blasphemy. And Ahab turns on him in fury, and he says,…

…he takes the animal rights position, and he says to Ahab, he says, captain, to seek revenge on a dumb brute seems blasphemy. And Ahab turns on him in fury, and he says, blasphemy, Starbuck. Speak not to me of blasphemy. I would strike out the sun if…

…Dick where Starbuck, the first mate, you remember wimpy little Starbuck. He stood for christian right reason, and he says to Captain Ahab to seek revenge on a dumb brute scene. Blasphemy. And Ahab says, blasphemy, Starbuck, speak not to me of blasphemy. I…

…Starbuck. He stood for christian right reason, and he says to Captain Ahab to seek revenge on a dumb brute scene. Blasphemy. And Ahab says, blasphemy, Starbuck, speak not to me of blasphemy. I would strike out the sun if it insulted me. For could it do…

…at war against the cosmos, which is a heroic stance if you're trying to produce melvillean opera out of your life. You know, Ahab says in Moby Dick, he's talking to his first mate Starbuck, who signifies christian right reason I. And he says he's raving…

…in the forties and the fifties. McLuhan expressly articulated this vision in the fifties and the sixties. This is really, you know, as Ahab tells the crew in Moby Dick, this is what you've shipped for mates. This was the plan. You know, Plato said, if…

…him the symbol of a principle that inscrutable thing is what I chiefly hate, he tells Starbuck. And I see it. I see Ahab as another reincarnation of Faust, another picture of a human being who seeks to go beyond what is humanly possible, and by rising…

…small part. This is from chapter 36, which is called the quarter deck. And those of you who've read it, but forget the story. Ahab at last, the captain of the Pequod. He calls the crew together and he reveals what this is about, that this is no search…

…and Melville comes out of that. But there is a moment in which the first mate. I'm sorry, yes, the first mate, Starbuck. Ahab is raving on. And. And Ahab and the first mate, who represents christian right reason, tries to inject a note of sanity into…

…But there is a moment in which the first mate. I'm sorry, yes, the first mate, Starbuck. Ahab is raving on. And. And Ahab and the first mate, who represents christian right reason, tries to inject a note of sanity into this undertaking. In other words,…

…into this undertaking. In other words, he's the straight man. He stands for Calvinism, rectitude, reason, science. And he says, speaking to Ahab, Starbucks says, ahab has just shouted to the crew, art not game for Moby Dick. And Starbucks says, I am game…

…art not game for Moby Dick. And Starbucks says, I am game for his crooked jaw and for the jaws of death, too, Captain Ahab, if it fairly comes in the way of the business we follow. But I came here to hunt whales, not my commander's vengeance. How…