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Herman Melville pretty much narrates this story himself, thinly disguised as Ishmael. It often veers off into long philosophical musings or technical descriptions of the business of whaling, particularly in the middle of the book. It can tend to drag down some in those instances. Yet all of this explanation serves to convey the author's obvious passion for this unique way of life. It's written with such enthusiasm that I couldn't bring myself to do anything but indulge him. I feel now as if I probably know more about that lost vocation than anyone save historians, and my fellow Moby Dick readers. And when he does return to his story, it's worth the wait as the characters are astoundingly real and simple yet powerful. There's something there that drew me in, even when struggling through the most ponderous and antiquated phrasings. Melville's writing isn't always easy to swallow, but it is deep, and at times in its own way as elemental as the sea he writes about. Paragraph by paragraph it seeps into you, and even when you don't follow him completely on one of his discourses, his passion and eloquence elevate the experience of reading to the point where it becomes difficult to stop yourself from diving into the next short chapter. This is a novel that will stick with me awhile; bits and pieces of it kicking around in the back of my head for probably years as I digest them. I'll probably go back years from now and read it again, just to see if I glean anything new from it.