But I think possibly he might also have had slightly more of a sense of humor and self-awareness about it?
The thing about Moby Dick is that MELVILLE NEVER BREAKS KAYFABE. I have no certainty about whether Moby Dick is the most ironic book ever or if Melville has absolutely zero self-awareness about how extra he is! There are literally passages where he spends pages developing the most obvious literary metaphors you've ever seen about whales and boats and then at the end he'll say explicitly "Nothing you just read was a metaphor. I meant it all literally." And I have no way of being sure if he's serious or clueless.
But after I wrote Ravel/Debussy slash, I read Jean Echenoz's novel Ravel and was very frustrated at Echenoz's refusal to declare an opinion about whether Ravel was gay or not, and so it sounds nice that at least Beauregard committed.
no subject
The thing about Moby Dick is that MELVILLE NEVER BREAKS KAYFABE. I have no certainty about whether Moby Dick is the most ironic book ever or if Melville has absolutely zero self-awareness about how extra he is! There are literally passages where he spends pages developing the most obvious literary metaphors you've ever seen about whales and boats and then at the end he'll say explicitly "Nothing you just read was a metaphor. I meant it all literally." And I have no way of being sure if he's serious or clueless.
But after I wrote Ravel/Debussy slash, I read Jean Echenoz's novel Ravel and was very frustrated at Echenoz's refusal to declare an opinion about whether Ravel was gay or not, and so it sounds nice that at least Beauregard committed.