character sketch of ishmael
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Ishmael is a character in Herman Melville's Moby-d!ck (1851), which opens with the line, "Call me Ishmael." He is the first person narrator in much of the book. Ishmael plays a minor role in the plot, however, and early critics of Moby-D!ck assumed that Captain Ahab is the protagonist. Many either confused Ishmael with Melville or overlooked the role he played. Later critics distinguished Ishmael from Melville, and some saw his mystic and speculative consciousness as the novel's central force rather Captain monomaniacal force of will.
Answer:
Ishmael probably is a more interesting narrator because he is a loner by nature. This allows him further objectivity and a freedom of evaluation that more involvement might dissuade. Melville frequently employs biblical allusions as keys to understanding in the novel, and he does so here. The biblical Ishmael (Genesis 16:1-16; 21:10 ff.) is disinherited and dismissed from his home in favor of his half-brother Isaac. The name suggests that the narrator is something of an outcast, a drifter, a fellow of no particular family other than mankind. Ishmael confirms his independent ways by telling us that he seeks no special rank aboard ship and would not want to be either a cook or a captain; he says he has enough responsibility just taking care of himself. Ishmael speaks of no family or even a last name. This is consistent with the ending of the book in which only Ishmael survives, picked up by the whaling ship Rachel, which, searching after its own missing children, finds only "another orphan" (Epilogue).
Ishmael probably is a more interesting narrator because he is a loner by nature. This allows him further objectivity and a freedom of evaluation that more involvement might dissuade. Melville frequently employs biblical allusions as keys to understanding in the novel, and he does so here. The biblical Ishmael (Genesis 16:1-16; 21:10 ff.) is disinherited and dismissed from his home in favor of his half-brother Isaac. The name suggests that the narrator is something of an outcast, a drifter, a fellow of no particular family other than mankind. Ishmael confirms his independent ways by telling us that he seeks no special rank aboard ship and would not want to be either a cook or a captain; he says he has enough responsibility just taking care of himself. Ishmael speaks of no family or even a last name. This is consistent with the ending of the book in which only Ishmael survives, picked up by the whaling ship Rachel, which, searching after its own missing children, finds only "another orphan" (Epilogue).Ishmael's isolation makes his one real friendship, with the Polynesian harpooner Queequeg, all the more important. Part of Ishmael's appeal as a narrator is that he is an open-minded character who is capable of change and growth. When he first meets Queequeg, in a bed they share at the Spouter-Inn, Ishmael is terrified. He sees the South Seas islander as a stereotypical "heathen" and fears that he is about to be killed by a cannibal. Just the opposite is true. Ishmael soon learns that Queequeg is one of the finest men he has ever known — caring, kind, generous, loyal, courageous, and wise. Together, they explore the rich possibilities existing in diversity. Ultimately, it is this acceptance that indirectly saves Ishmael's life.