September 1, 2019 - Chapter One Hundred Thirty-five (pp. 562-567)


And here it ends, and the white whale wins. He charges the Pequod head on and destroys the ship. Ahab, disgusted with the turn of events, casts his harpoon at Moby Dick, and though the harpoon strikes the whale, the result is that the whale drags Ahab and the remaining sailors into a whirlpool that pulls everything down into the sea with it. Remarkably, after the water settles, the sea appears as if nothing had happened there, as it has been for “five thousand years.” The final scene strongly implies that what we have witnessed is merely the course of nature. Whalers come and go (as does whales), but the sea continues forever.

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