On its surface, Moby-Dick is a book about a whale. (Less charitably, it is a 600-page, 173-year-old book about a whale.) But, look, this is a book about the unfathomable depths of the ocean and the mind, and the mysteries that exist therein — what use do we have for how things appear on the surface? For the past hundred years (after being almost entirely ignored for the first fifty years after its publication), Moby-Dick has been widely called the greatest American book, carrying within it potent lessons about fate and freewill, environmental degradation, power and persuasion, race and racism, sexual identity, madness and obsession, math and science, faith and doubt, God and religion, and the nature of perception. It also has much to teach us about coping with adversity, respecting ideological diversity, and living skilfully in a fickle, slippery world. Perhaps most importantly, one of Melville’s projects in the book is to show us that, just as every whaleman has his own unique notion regarding Moby Dick the whale, every reader has their own unique understanding of Moby-Dick the book. As Ishmael says, it “begins to assume different aspects, according to your point of view.” This is, of course, true of all literature. And it is this special relationship between reader and text that makes the study of literature so valuable in a person's life. We will spend the entire semester (!) immersed in this deepest of texts (and, somehow, we will not come close to exhausting all its wonders). We will discuss the book in great detail. We will write formal essays and informal reflections and explorations. We will make art. We will investigate secondary material and academic scholarship. We will embark on individual research projects. You will finish the course with a thorough understanding and appreciation (even if you end up hating it, which is entirely possible and totally fine) of one of the greatest books ever written.