Fathoms Down

Half the fun of reading Melville’s works for me is diving into the murky references throughout. In reading The Library of America Melville – Typee, Omoo, Mardi for the past two months there have been waves of obscurity as frequent as the tides. A collection of these follows:

Typee

• Tenier’s Saints (246) David Tenier the Younger – artist
• Dibdin: “There’s a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft, To look out for the life of poor Jack.” (252)

Omoo

• Urim and Thummim (358): Urim is derived from the Hebrew for “light”, or “to give light”, and Thummim from “completeness”, “perfection”, or “innocence”.
• Clarence in the butt of Malmsey (368) The creature certainly died a luscious death, quite equal to Clarence’s in the butt of Malmsey.
• Rule of Three (389)
• Alexander Pope’s “Epistle to A Lady”
• Rizzio

Mardi

• Whistonian theory concerning the damned and the comets: Whiston fancied that the earth was created from the atmosphere of one comet, and that it was deluged by the tail of another. The heat which remained from its first origin, in his opinion, excited the whole antediluvian population, men and animals, to sin, for which they were all drowned in the deluge, excepting the fish, whose passions were apparently less violent.
• Sesotris
• Thermopylae
• Tartarus: Tartarus is the lowest region of the world, as far below earth as earth is from heaven.
• Epaminondas
• Belshazzar
• Belisarius
• Hafiz
• Paracelsus
• Chimborazo

There have also been several eloquent quotes or passages I’ve jotted down. Those will be up tomorrow.