This is the parasitical relationships referred to in the three epigraphs from Shakespeare’s great contemporary, Ben Jonson, the popular science writer Carl Zimmer and the French philosopher and historian of science Michel Serres. While there is no doubt that the relationship between predator and prey is relevant to Moby-Dick, as well as to a work such as “Benito Cereno,” to my mind, there is another type of biological interaction that might prove to be equally important-if not more so-if the aim is a better understanding of what typically defines relationships in Melville’s writings. Crucially, in the “wolfish world” portrayed by Ishmael ( MD 51), man does not only prey upon the creatures of the sea, but also upon his fellow men: Homo homini lupus est. Not only is it easy to understand the battle between Ahab and Moby Dick as a clash between two mighty predators trying to defeat each other, but, as Elizabeth Schultz has pointed out, imagery supporting such a reading abounds in the novel, where Ahab is repeatedly associated with predatory animals like leopards, tigers, bears, and wolves (102). To readers of Moby-Dick, in particular, the answer might seem obvious: Ishmael’s description of the “universal cannibalism of the sea all whose creatures prey upon each other, carrying on eternal war since the world began” ( MD 274) points to predation. For this reason, please take a moment to consider the following question: If the relationships-be they between humans, or between humans and animals-depicted in Melville’s texts were to be described in biological terms, which type of relationship would be the most relevant? There can be no doubt that Herman Melville (1819–1891) was keenly interested in all manner of living creatures-as Johan Warodell has noted, not only did he write “one of the world’s most famous books about an animal,” one can find references to more than 350 different species in his works (68–9). In other words, the study of life is, for the most part, parasitology.” According to one estimate, parasites may outnumber free-living species four to one. “Scientists … have no idea how many species of parasites there are, but they do know one dazzling thing: parasites make up the majority of species on Earth. All the wise world is little else in nature But parasites or sub-parasites.”īen Jonson, Volpone, Act 3, Scene 1, Line 11–13
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