# Homoeroticsm in Moby Dick? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 9, 2003, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579 "2003-06-09T03:09:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![AveDementia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/bc8723/32.png) [@AveDementia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AveDementia)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/21 "2003-06-09T14:53:37Z")
Yeah, but weren’t they spooning naked? I don’t know how two dudes spooning naked _isn’t_ considered homoerotic…especially in the morning… ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/22 "2003-06-09T16:04:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RealityChuck \* > There’s no homoerotic subtext in the book. It’s just on the part of the readers. I don’t think you can say this with the degree of absolute finality that you have. I think Melville’s choice of words definitely allude strongly to a homoerotic subtext. There is ample textual evidence to support such a reading, and a little research into Melville’s biography and other works also lends evidence to this reading. > [@](#): > > You’re assuming Melville was writing in the 21st century. He was not and it would hardly be his intention to portray an unnatural and perverted crime against God in a novel that was intended to be a popular bestseller.\* No, I do not assume that. It is you who are assuming: that no one talked about homosexuality then, that no one wrote about it, and that everyone thought of it as a perverted crime against nature. Read some Walt Whitman or Oscar Wilde and tell me that none of Melville’s literary contemporaries addressed homoerotic themes. There is apparently ample evidence that Melville himself had homosexual tendencies. Why then is it so hard to believe that there is an intended homosexual subtext in Moby Dick? Recall also that another “crime against God” takes place in the same chapter: Ishmael worships Queequeg’s idol. This is in direct violation of the Commandment against worshiping no God except Yahweh, no? Ishmael is bustin’ out all over in Chapter 10. > [@](#): > > At the time, two men sharing a bed had no sexual connotations (this isn’t to say homosexuality didn’t exist, just that few would make the connection). Beds were primarily sleeping places, and often scarce, and few thought of homosexual connections. Men would share a bed simply because beds were expensive and sleeping space hard to find. Ishmael’s description of his time in bed with Queequeg goes FAR beyond mere relief that he has found a decent roommate. He compares them to a happily married couple, for God’s sake! Why would Melville go so far as to link their camaraderie to the romantic union of a man and a woman if he did not intend a homoerotic subtext? I don’t think you’re giving Melville enough credit here. He knew what he was saying and how he chose to depict this relationship. > [@](#): > > Nowadays we look upon this differently. But it’s essential when interpreting a book to think of it in terms of its time. Male friendship in the 19th century did not automatically imply any sexual component. Queequeg and Ishmael go beyond simple male friendship: they mingle their finances, they lay in bed in each other’s arms, etc. I think you have this fallacious idea that homosexuality was simply not discussed or written about in the 19th century, which is patently false. There were queer people in the 19th century, and many of them wrote books. Moby Dick is only one of them. ---
**Author:** ![shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shrew)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/23 "2003-06-09T16:14:17Z")
_Moby Dick_ is widely thought to be a homoerotic book, at least _widely thought_ within literary circles of book geeks such as myself. The only stage version of Moby Dick I’ve ever attended where homoeroticism was ignored was in an all-female cast version. The director really tried to make it about the hunt…and it worked. But as for the book…yeah, it’s blatantly homoerotic. And no, I’m not judging it through 21st century eyes. I’m assessing it through very educated, enlightened eyes that have considered all possibilities. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/24 "2003-06-09T17:07:49Z")
**Rubystreak** – You should talk with Francis Wertham. He proved conclusively that you see what you want to see. When all one has is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. You’re ignoring the fact that Melville was writing a popular novel and the main audience for this novel was people who would be repulsed by any sign of homosexuality. He’d be a utter fool to put it in. (Your worship example is irrelevant. You might get people of the time to accept that, but never homosexuality.) > [@](#): > > Ishmael’s description of his time in bed with Queequeg goes FAR beyond mere relief that he has found a decent roommate. He compares them to a happily married couple, for God’s sake! Why would Melville go so far as to link their camaraderie to the romantic union of a man and a woman if he did not intend a homoerotic subtext? Your anachronistic attitude is showing. Yes, he would – because he and the readers of the time would not read it that way. It was common back then to talk of male friendship in what today would be highly intimate terms. It did not signify homosexuality; the cultural context has changed. But unless you stop sticking with a modern cultural context, you’re going to see homosexuality whether it was intended or not. The big problem with Melville is that people have never read the type of novels he was trying to emulate. Once you’ve seen something like “The Curse of Clifton” by Mrs. E.D.E.N. Soutworth, you’ll see that two men talking about each other in florid terms that sound suspiciously homosexual today were nothing of the sort at the time. It was how two straight friends (using current parlance) were expected to talk (and act) in literary works. Most critics have no exposure to the big picture of 19th century writing and make their comments in a vaccum – and with their 21st century assumptions so much a part of them that they don’t realize they’re there. One of the hardest things for people to understand (especially in literary criticism) is that people in the past _thought_ differently than we do. You’re assuming Melville thought exactly like you do, and that’s a big mistake. ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/25 "2003-06-09T19:05:11Z")
**Reality Chuck** , I am not assuming Melville thought like I do. I know he did. His letters to Nathaniel Hawthorne were blatantly homoerotic; he definitely swung in that direction. I also give Melville a little bit more credit than you do. He knew what images he was depicting and deliberately chose to insinuate a romantic tone into his descriptions of Queequeg and Ishmael in bed together, honeymooning, as it were. Your insistence that there IS NO HOMOEROTICISM flies right in the face of the actual text. It’s there, and having done a bit of research, I believe that Melville made a conscious choice to put it there. As I said in my last post, he was hardly the only 19th century author to depict homoeroticism in his writing. Was he attempting to sublimate the homoerotic subtext? Absolutely, but it’s still quite blatantly there. It’s also acknowledged widely in academia, so denying it doesn’t really carry much weight, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/26 "2003-06-09T20:38:55Z")
“Billy Budd,” on the other hand… ---
**Author:** ![DadWagonDriver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/edb3f5/32.png) [@DadWagonDriver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DadWagonDriver)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/27 "2003-06-09T21:42:53Z")
Just to check in here, I spent a good portion of last semester studying Melville’s poetry, including _Song of Myself_. I have not read _Moby Dick_ (yet) but I would not be surprised if there was homoerotic text in it. The theme is prevalent throughout the poetry of his that I studied. And **Reality Chuck** , Melville frequently used playful text to allude to homosexuality in his works. By using playful text, not every reader could catch on to the themes. ---
**Author:** ![Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e47c2d/32.png) [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/28 "2003-06-09T21:49:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by wmulax93 \* > \*\*Just to check in here, I spent a good portion of last semester studying Melville’s poetry, including _Song of Myself_. \*\* “Song of Myself” is Walt Whitman, not Melville. ---
**Author:** ![DadWagonDriver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/edb3f5/32.png) [@DadWagonDriver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DadWagonDriver)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/29 "2003-06-09T22:27:32Z")
Dammit, dammit, dammit… never post when you’ve just woken up from a nap. Sorry, disregard the idiot posting garbage. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2003, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/30 "2003-06-09T22:59:05Z")
Not having read _Moby Dick_, I can’t comment on that work specifically, but I can point out that there is such thing as context-yes, people in the past and in other cultures are often more demonstrative, and activities we see as blatantly sexual-such as sharing a bed, a kiss in greeting, etc-is often very innocent. That being said, of course homosexuality is as old as time, and reading the excerpts here, I have no doubt there’s some homoerotic elements. (Make your obvious jokes about sailors on a long voyage away from women, etc). However, in a book like _Huck Finn_-Jim was more than anything, it seems, a father figure to young Huck. He was what-in his late twenties, and Huck was, at the oldest, fourteen. If you think that there was a homoerotic element THERE, I’d say you have a dirty mind. So basically, context is everything. Don’t be too quick to assume it’s about sex, but don’t totally write it out. Make sense? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/31 "2003-06-10T00:56:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Rubystreak \* > \*\ ***Reality Chuck** , I am not assuming Melville thought like I do. I know he did. You _know_? You were there and you asked him about it? You observed his actions? Really? No. Despite your denials, that statement of yours above is positive proof that you _are_ assuming he thought like you did. You are _interpreting_ his words as showing a homosexual subtext. That’s understandable, because someone nowadays would clearly think such was the case. But because you won’t give up this base assumption that someone writing in the 19th century would have the same mindset as someone today, your conclusion is flawed. > [@](#): > > His letters to Nathaniel Hawthorne were blatantly homoerotic; he definitely swung in that direction. \*\* By your 21st century interpretation. Again, you see things that currently would indicate a homosexual relationship, but did not _at the time they were written_. Men of the time would often write to other men in florid prose, with declarations of love for each other, and be repulsed by the suggestion there was anything sexual about it. People were _different_ in the past. You can’t assume they thought the same any more than you could assume they spent their evenings watching TV. And that’s especially true of something like homosexualty. > [@](#): > > I also give Melville a little bit more credit than you do. He knew what images he was depicting and deliberately chose to insinuate a romantic tone into his descriptions of Queequeg and Ishmael in bed together, honeymooning, as it were. What is the basis other than your own anachronistic interpretation? Male-to-male friendship was often portrayed in just such terms at the time, with no suggestion of homosexuality. You need to read more than the classics to understand this. Melville was trying to write a best seller, not a literary work. > [@](#): > > Your insistence that there IS NO HOMOEROTICISM flies right in the face of the actual text. Certainly a modern reader can see a homoerotic subtext; I have not argued that point. But one sees what one is used to seeing. The bigger question was _Melville_ putting in a homoerotic subtext. There are three basic types of subtext: Those put in deliberately by the author, those put in unconsciously by the author, and those the reader sees. They are all tricky to determine, but the last two are particularly hard, and nearly impossible in a vacuum. What we do know about Melville’s life would seem to indicate he wasn’t homosexual – he did marry and had four children. That’s much stronger evidence of his sexual orientation than a few letters. Academics are particularly prone to interpreting works to fit their predjudices (especially since a different interpretation is a route to tenure) – see the “Wizard of Oz as Populist” Metaphor. But being able to justify a particular interpretation of a work does not make that interpretation is correct. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/32 "2003-06-10T04:26:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by dropzone \* > \*\*“Billy Budd,” on the other hand… \*\* ## Oh yes, absolutely. “Handsome is as handsome did it!” RE: the other book we’re discussing here…Well, my gosh, just look at the _title_! \ ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/33 "2003-06-10T17:34:35Z")
Reality Chuck: Your question about me talking to Melville, while meant to be sarcastic, betrays your inability to see my point, which is that we have more than enough context clues both from within the texts and in Melville’s other writings to justify a homoerotic reading. This is not the ONLY possible reading, but just as I cannot definitely state what Melville’s intentions were, NEITHER CAN YOU. As long as I can back up my theory with textual evidence (and I can), my theory cannot be discounted out of hand as you have attempted. Melville’s homoerotic tendency is displayed in his letters to Hawthorne, as well as in Moby Dick, but also Billy Budd, My Chimney, and Pierre. There is an entire book called The Gay Herman Melville Reader. So clearly this “assumption” I’m making has been made by many others, most of whom probably know a hell of a lot more about Melville than you and I combined. Elizabeth Hardwick’s new biography also posits a deep vein of homoeroticism in his writings, both fictional and personal. This is not to say that Melville was actively gay; the fact that he was passionately interested in other men is enough to legitimize claims that he was writing about masculine love. BTW, being married hardly precludes a man from being sexually interested in other men,nor does it prevent him from writing “lavender prose.” Your claim that people in the past were somehow inherently “different” doesn’t cut a lot of ice with me either. Writing with a homoerotic bent was not unknown in Melville’s time, a fact that you have blithely ignored. You don’t have to take my word for it; read The Gay Melville Reader and write a letter to its editor, Ken Schellenberg, or to scholar David Garrett Izzo, who states “One cannot refute the possibilities that these printed words evoke. Here in one anthology are the selections from which a serious argument can be made by both readers and scholars that a subtext exists that can be seen as homoerotic.” I rest my case. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/34 "2003-06-10T18:05:49Z")
Anyone want to deny that there is a trace of homoeroticism in this passage? 😃 “Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it; I squeezed that sperm till a strange sort of insanity came over me; and I found myself unwittingly squeezing my co-laborers’ hands in it, mistaking their hands for the gentle globules. Such an abounding, affectionate, friendly, loving feeling did this avocation beget; that at last I was continually squeezing their hands, and looking up into their eyes sentimentally; as much as to say, - Oh! my dear fellow beings, why should we longer cherish any social acerbities, or know the slightest ill-humor or envy! Come; let us squeeze hands all round; nay, let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness.” ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/35 "2003-06-10T18:20:39Z")
> [@](#): > > … let us all squeeze ourselves into each other; let us squeeze ourselves universally into the very milk and sperm of kindness. Am I the only one who imagines this in William S. Burroughs’ creaking, f\*cked up voice? Probably. ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/36 "2003-06-10T20:28:14Z")
I came into this thread completely ignorant as to how much homoerotic subtext was in Melville’s work. So far, reading the discussion, I have to agree with **RubyStreak**. Simply announcing “that’s not how things were done!” when discussing literature is not convincing in the least, **RealityChuck**. ---
**Author:** ![Winston\_Bongo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a9adbd/32.png) [@Winston\_Bongo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winston_Bongo)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/37 "2003-06-10T20:58:12Z")
And by all means let’s not disregard that obscure and little-remembered work, **Intentional Homoerotic Subtext Among My Male Fictional Characters: That Kind of Thing IS My Bag, Baby** by Herman Melville. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/38 "2003-06-10T22:29:02Z")
From IN LIVING COLOR: Antwan: The next book we’re going to talk about is Moby Dick… Blaine: Oooh, now that’s my kinda book… Antwan: Oh silly! MOBY DICK was a whale! Blaine: I bet he was… I think that pretty much settles it. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/39 "2003-06-10T22:30:54Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Winston Bongo \* > \*\*And by all means let’s not disregard that obscure and little-remembered work, **Intentional Homoerotic Subtext Among My Male Fictional Characters: That Kind of Thing IS My Bag, Baby** by Herman Melville. \*\* Or MD’s sequel, MOBY DICK 2: CALL ME ANYTHING YOU WANT, BABY, JUST GET ME ON THAT SHIP! ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2003, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579/40 "2003-06-10T23:17:26Z")
This is silly. Melville could have written, “As I lay there next to Queequeg, my member stirred and I began to frot it against his naked backside as I passionately kissed the back of his neck” and the usual gang would troop in and scream, “That’s just how men _talked_ in those days!” It’s not just literature. **Hamish** tells a great story about having delivered a presentation on Michelangelo in high school. The teacher took him aside after and said, “Why didn’t you mention about his being gay?” He was stunned - _none of the biographies had said anything about it_, when any biography of a heterosexual would wax eloquent about their amours. **Hamish** , having just completed his B.A. majoring in English lit, would be able to wax more vitriolic about it, but it drives me bonkers that the thought that there were actual gay people back then and that some of them may have actually been writing about gay attraction is so often placed absolutely outside of the realm of consideration. That’s not “just how men talked to each other in those days.” That’s how people have tried to silence men talking to each other in those days. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/homoeroticsm-in-moby-dick/180579.md?page=3)