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1. 24/5/2016 A Comparison of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick and William Shakespeare’s Hamlet | A Look at Herman Melville
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A Look at Herman Melville
A Comparison of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick
and William Shakespeare’s Hamlet
30 Thursday Oct 4
POSTED BY HDENNISO IN LITERATURE
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Antebellum, Antebellum Literature, Captain Ahab, Hamlet, Herman Melville, Ishmael, Literature,
Melville, Moby Dick, Queequeg, Shakespeare
Herman Melville was deeply in uenced by Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s lecture on Hamlet. This
has long been established and they allusions Melville makes to Hamlet and other plays by
Shakespeare are countless. I believe that Shakespeare in uenced Melville to the point where
Moby Dick is a contemporary version of Hamlet. In order to illustrate my point, I will list the
characters of Moby Dick along with their counterparts in Hamlet. Following this, I will expand
upon my reasoning for why the character in one work matches with the other.
Moby Dick Hamlet
Ishmael Fortinbras
Captain Ahab Hamlet
Moby Dick King Claudius
Ahab’s Leg Human and fihalebone Gertrude
Starbuck Polonius
Elijah Ghost of Hamlet’s father
Queequeg Ophelia
Fedellah Horatio
Stubb Laertes
Captain Bildad Rosencran
Captain Peleg Guildenstern
As Ishmael is the lone survivor of the Pequod, he became a nice t for Fortinbras as both

2. 24/5/2016 A Comparison of Herman Melville’s Moby Dick and William Shakespeare’s Hamlet | A Look at Herman Melville
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As Ishmael is the lone survivor of the Pequod, he became a nice t for Fortinbras as both
survived the mass tragedy from afar. Captain Ahab was the clear t for Prince Hamlet, as both
descend into questionable madness. The monomania of the fihite fihale Moby Dick and
avenging his father’s death Hamlet make Captain Ahab a clear t for Hamlet, and Moby Dick
for King Claudius. Ahab’s leg is an odd, but good t for the role of Gertrude because Moby
Dick King Claudius stole the leg Gertrude from Captain Ahab Hamlet . Starbuck is Ahab’s
solemn advisor as Polonius is to Claudius, making it interesting that Starbuck stays on the
Pequod while Ahab hunts Moby Dick. Elijah plays the Ghost of Hamlet’s father as the one who
foreshadows the demise of the characters. Queequeg is Ophelia, though it may seem like an
odd t. Both become overly dramatic and a li♬le mad, though Ophelia does end up dying.
Fedellah is grave and logical, reasoning with Ahab not through words but looks – similar to
Horatio and Hamlet. Stubb plays the role of Laertes as the slightly dumb counterpart of
Polonius. Bildad and Peleg play Rosencran and Guildenstern as bit actors that complete one
another.
The allusions to Hamlet in Moby Dick are so numerous that the book could be viewed as a
contemporary production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet with the characters as actors and the ship as
a castle.
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