by Anura Guruge
on June 25, 2022
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I have yet to read ‘Moby-Dick‘. I doubt that I ever will. Some of the print versions run to 760(+) pages! That is long. Yes, I have read books of that length, but they tended to be rather more gripping & compelling.
But, I am listening to it — as we ‘speak’ (so to say). As you can see from the 2nd image (above) it is nearly 25-hours long in audio form. I listen to ‘Audible‘ at 0.95% playback rate (to compensate for my many distractions). That means it will take me 26-hours to listen to the whole thing — & that is without the constant rewinds I have to do!
I still have some 8 hours left.
Have I enjoyed it? Kind of. Not great. I have listened to better. I listened to ‘Middlemarch’ last September. That was even longer at 32.5-hours. But, that was GOOD. Gripping. Compelling. I didn’t want it to STOP.
Not so with Moby-Dick. There is so much inane ‘fluff’. Lot of boring stuff. Plus, we all know what the ending is going to be like. I am not sure of the exact details, BUT I am pretty sure it involves them harpooning the white whale.
As an author myself I can’t help thinking what would happen IF Herman Melville tried to get it published today. Would any major publishing house touch it.
This book was written, in such prodigious length, at a time when there was no that many forms of domestic entertainment open to folks. No TV. No radio. No Tik-Tok. No Facebook. No Internet. No phones …
Will people today have the patience to wade through it? I doubt it.
It is not doing that well in the Amazon rankings. People aren’t buying it.
This is something that keeps on crossing my mind as I listen to it. Would it ever be considered a classic if it came out now?
I will be interested in what YOU think. Thanks.