In this gripping conclusion to the Columbia Workshop's adaptation of Herman Melville's "Moby Dick," listeners are taken on a dramatic journey aboard the whaling ship Pequod, led by the relentless Captain Ahab. The episode captures the intense pursuit of the legendary white whale, Moby Dick, as Ahab's obsession drives the crew through treacherous seas and storms. The narrative, told through the eyes of Ishmael, paints a vivid picture of the crew's despair and Ahab's unyielding quest for vengeance, culminating in a climactic confrontation with the whale.
The adaptation, skillfully directed by Howard G. Barnes and featuring a special musical score by Norman Lockwood, brings to life the haunting and tragic tale of obsession and revenge. With standout performances by Sydney Smith as Ishmael, Neil O'Malley as Ahab, and Charles Irving as Starbuck, this episode captures the essence of Melville's classic novel. As the Pequod meets its fate, the story leaves listeners reflecting on the destructive nature of obsession and the unforgiving power of the sea.
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The Columbia workshop, radio's foremost laboratory of writing and production techniques presents the second and concluding part of a two part adaptation of the great American classic of the sea, Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Ernest Kanoy adapted the novel for the Columbia workshop and the special musical score was composed by Norman Lockwood and is conducted by Frederick Steiner. The program is directed by Howard G. Barnes. The iron well of Captain Ahab drives the whaling ship Pequod forward ever forward, weary month after weary month, in mad pursuit of the fabulous white whale Moby Dick. The officers and crew grumble and dream of home, but cannot bend the single purpose of the revenge obsessed tyrant.
Captain Ahab walks the decks of the Pequod with an ivory stump where Moby Dick took off his leg when last they met. The tale is told by Ishmael.
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Pray, gaunt Ahab pacing the tilting quarter deck. His slim white ivory leg pounding in eternal thumping rhythm, searching, hunting the enemy that robbed him of his leg. Across the storm tossed ocean round the horn through the Indian seas and out upon the broad Pacific. Close on the foam thrashed wake of Moby Dick, a monstrous white whale. To Ehab's unhinged fire, the focus and embodiment of infinite malignant evil. Just as the unsettling polar star, so Ahab's purpose gleamed down on a constant midnight of the ship's gloomy crew. In this foreshadowing interval, all humor vanished.
Starbuck the maid smiled no more and stubbed the second officer stilled his cheerful song. Like machines, they dumbly moved on deck. Ever conscious of the old man's desperate eye was on them.
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If they have, sir, we must send down the main tops of the yard. Strike sail, mister Stapleton. I assure the e lift is half stranded. Shall I strike it, sir? Quite nothing. I should. If I had sky some poles, I'd sway them up now and carry double canvas. We're on his tail, Saver. We close all day on Moby Dick. Double canvas in a gale, sir. It is madness at me. Aye, stalwart mad demoniac. Thou dost abhor thy captain's army. But stubbeth Marty and stubbeth Will or Rahab. My magnet at thy brain draws off rebellion. Insane old man, beware thyself. Hark ye, sabote. We strike no sail nor short and canvas. And out of the typhoon sweeps away the mast until the masthead cries out for Moby Dick, until he spouts black wood.
And in this hand, I clutch his evil heart.
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And when the seas had calmed again in the summer cool weather of these latitudes, the open sunbeat deck invited Perp, the blacksmith. And he rigged his forge lashed tight to ring bolts in the deck. Surrounded by an eager circle all waiting to be served, he mended boats, babes, pike heads, harpoons, and lances. He worked in a shower of darting sparks that sprayed round him in thick hovering
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flight. My father was the keeper of the Eddystone light. He married a mermaid one fine night. Out of his union there came three. The two was vicious. The other was me. Ho ho ho. The wind blows free. Oh, for the life on the roving sea. Excellent. Excellent.
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Them without a scorch. Because I am scorched all over, captain. Not easily canst thou scorch a scar. What wilst thou making there? Well, they get old pike head, sir. There was seams and dents in it. And canst thou make it all smooth again, blacksmith,
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after such hard usage as it had? I think so, sir. How canst smooth seams and dents no matter how hard the metal? Aye, sir. All seams and dents but one. Look ye here then. Here. Can ye smooth out the wrinkled seam of madness in my brow? If thou couldst, blacksmith, latten up what I lay my head upon the anvil and feel thy heaviest hammer between my eyes. Answer, havest thou smoothed this seam? Nay, sir.
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That is the one dent insensible of like Smith's hammer. Aye, man. It is unsmoothable.
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For though thou sees it here in my flesh, it has worked down into the bone of my skull. But no more of pikes and gaps today. Look to here, blacksmith. Steel, gabbard nail stubs of shoes of racing horses.
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Aye, captain Ahab. Thou hast there the best and stubbornest stuff we work. Aye, perp.
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And thou must forge me a harpoon. A thousand yokes of fiends could not pass. A blade that'll stick in a whale like his own pin bone. Forge me that blade, and it'll break the blood of Moby
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Dick.
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Through the tropic afternoon, the blacksmith heated and hammered the stubborn steel. And wildly had peace beside the forge and fixed the blade with greedy eyes. Then as the sun sank down beyond the yard, the blacksmith
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but for the tempering, will you shove the water cast, Neil? No. No. No water.
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I want it of the true death temper. Hi there. I say go. I go. Quick, quick. What say you, you pagan harpooners? Will you give me as much blood as will cover this bar? Blood? Blood? Aye. Aye. Blood. For a true temper. For a blade as sharp as the needle's sleet of the icy sea. Aye, captain. I'm willing. Aye, captain. Your arms, then. And with the knife. Watch, Tango. Tango. Quick, Greg. Now then, put ye your arms over this hot blade and turn them. There. Tempered in blood, ye harpoon. Baptized in the name of the devil. Mohave dick. I hold thy death.
And now I'll drink thy heart's blood and see thee roll. Hey, now.
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Down swept the Pequod on the line, the cruising ground across the Equator, flooring for whales, rocking in the tiny boats on a slow heaving swell. But warmest climbs but nurse the cruelest fangs. Sky is the most intelligent, but fast get the deadliest thunders. And from out that cloudless sky burst the direst of all storms, the typhoon. By evening, the peak quad tone of a canvas and bear poles struggle as sky and sea roar. The burial attempt.
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Stop. Go. Hi, mister Dava. Come out. Oh, double dash. Stop my singing in the world but to cut my throat, and then can the one that sing you the doxology for a rhino. Foster, listen to see it. In the dark with the Pacific brand on my floor. Look. Yeah. The gale comes full against the course we steer for Moby Dick. There in the lightning. Marking half full. Here. The book's dropping. I fresh in the stern sheets where the old man stands. Now stop jump over, lord, and sing if thou must. I don't watch in the wind. A gale that hammers us now. We can turn it to a fair wind to drive home. Yonder the windward, all is black as a doom.
But lowered away from Moby Dick is home. Oh, god. Turn us back to Nantucket and home. Go. Aye, captain. Come not about right into it. Hey, captain. Let me square the odds where we may and make a fair voyage of it homeless. At first, Starbuck. I'll cut down the first to cast you, sir. Robson. Too long to hunt the white whales are as binding as mine own. Hey, Starbucks. We ride into the typhoon. But the anchors are working, sir. Can I get them inboard? Sir, nothing but lash everything. The wind rises. Thick and sheet work. I mass and keels. You take thee for the hunchback skippers coast and smacks. Send down the sails.
No. No.
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Next morning, the sea rolled in long, slow billows, and striving in the pequod gurgling track, pushed her on like giant palms outstretched. The sea was as a crucible of molten gold that bubblingly leaps with light and heat. And then, splitting the lazy silence, the masked head cries. On the horizon, mister Gansal just visible over the saucer of ocean, a large ship, the Rachel, bore down directly on the Pequod, her spas thick flake clustering with men. The Rachel's captain put off, and soon his boat hook clinched the Pequod main chain.
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Uhoy there. I've seen the white whale. Hey. Yesterday. Get behind up here. Yes, sir. Up.
[00:12:06] Unknown:
Ever seen a whale boat adrift? Nay. But the white whale, was he killed? Moby Dick still lives. He does. You've not seen a whale boat adrift? It was yesterday the cursed white whale ran off with our lead boat fast to him, flowed out of sight in less than an hour. Eight good men save them. You'd stop in the height of the season for one missing boat. My boy, my own boy is among them. For love of heavy captain, try to split forty hours. Let me charter your ship to help the search. I'll pay and roundly pay. His son, captain Ahab. We'll save his son?
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Nay, sir. Nay?
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I am not cold. Would you say hi to me? I lay captain. You've got a boy home now. Yes. You'll relent. I can see it. Come then, men.
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Stand by to spare the yards in the air. That's not a rope you're on. Captain, I will not do it even though I lose time. Goodbye. God bless your man, and may I forgive myself. Mister Starbuck. Aye, sir. Three minutes hence. Race forward and have the ship sail on. I say I beg. I plead my son, captain. Mister Starbuck, pin sail upon the wake of Moby Dick.
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Soon, the two ships diverged their wakes. As long as the strange vessel was in sight, she yawed hither and thither. And by her winding woeful way, you plainly saw that this ship that was so weeping with spray still remained without comfort. She was Rachel who wept for her children because they were
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not.
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The days went by, and the Pequod rose and fell heavily with every wave. And Ahab, driven by the fire within him, strode the deck with restless urgency.
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Starbuck. Aye, sir. Oh, Starbuck. The mild, mild wind and gentle sky. On such a day as this, I struck my first swell. 18, I was. Forty forty years to ago. A long time, captain. And not three years ashore. Curb, weariness. Four years on dry, salted fare, fit emblem of the dry nourishment of my soul. Thou art married? I, a young girl, but a wife, rather a widow whose husband lives. I widowed that girl when I married her, Stavoc. Olde have more a demon than a man. By this strife, this chase, how richer or better is Ahab now, dismasted, and I've repaid a proper stump.
I feel deadly bowed and humps. Though I were Adam staggering beneath the pile centuries in paradise. Captain, the wind blows to Nantucket. Stand close, Stavit. Let me look into a human eye. I see my wife and child in thine eye. Stabbath, do thou stay on board the Pequod. Lower not when I do. When Brandon Ahab gives chase to Moby Dick, that hazard shall not be thine. Captain, noble soul, why should anyone give chase to that hated fish? No, Sabot. Away. Let us fly those deadly waters. Let us home. Wife and child too are mild. Let the alter course have impact my heart, stave my brain, mockery, bitter mockery. Let me square, captain. How cheerily would we bow on our way to see old Nantucket again.
All the mild blue days like this one on Nantucket Island. Aye. And about this time, the boy awakes, sits up in bed, and his mother speaks of Ahab, a broad on the deep, who will yet be home again. 'Tis my Mary, my Mary herself. She promised every morning would my son be carried to the highest hill to catch first glimpse of his father's sail. What is it, Starbot? What cruel and hidden lord is he that orders me against all natural lovings and longings? Is Ahab Ahab? Is it I or God or who that lifts this arm? Like hidden men, we'll turn round and round like yonder windlass and face the hand spike.
But we'll sleep at last, darling. I cling to that. We'll sleep at last. Home, captain. Home. Change the course. Speak back to home. Thy wife, thy child, they? Where are they? All Aye, sir. Stand by. Let go. Keep the ship, sir. Aye, sir. Go lower, sir. Now, men, un ship your oil. Oil. Now then, fool. Blast you. Beat me on the back of Moby Dick. I seething out. Fool.
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The ocean grew smooth, and now they saw him wallowing in the trough. His dazzling hump visible sliding along the sea. His tiny malignant eye fixed out over the waves. His massive wrinkled forehead towering over the swells. Seabirds roosted on his craggy head. So swam a Into the churning seas spilled Ahab as the whale jaws crushed the frail gunwales and sliced the boat in two. Withdrawn from his prey, Moby Dick now laid a little distance. Swiftly and round he swam churning the water in his wenchful wake, barring from the floating wrecking other boats till down upon the circle of boats and the maddened whale bore the pequan, close upon the maelstrom that battered swimming in.
They fished up floating mariners and shattered whaling gear. And then, Old Ahab dragged from the sea, stood again on his quarter deck. The morning of the third day dawned fair and fresh. And once more, the lookout started every masthead and almost every spar. Time itself now held long breaths with keen suspense. Hours passed. Gold beaten out to ages.
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Upon this earth. Aye, sir. Thou wilt have it so. Some men die at it tight. Robert. Some at low water and some at the full of the flood. Shake hands with me now, man. Oh, captain. Captain, go not. Go not. Man your boats. Stand by the crew. Oh, Arthur, you're off steel. What is this that shoots through me and leaves me so deadly calm and expectant, fixed at the top of a shutter? Merry girl, thou padest before me. Cast her thyself, Starbucks. Take it off. Oh, I have. I have. Shudder, old man. The rest brought down death upon us.
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The whale boats rocked slowly where the spouting Moby Dick had sounded, waiting till he should rise and blow again. Suddenly, the waters around them slowly swelled in broad circles and quickly appeared. A low grumbling sound, a subterranean hub, and shrouded in a thin drooping veil of mist, fast form shot lengthwise from the sea.
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She reaches She reaches back. She reaches back. Give away. Backwater off. He cuts that boat, captain, and the other. Which do we pick him up, captain? Hey, nay. Please still boat, and Moby Dick lies two boat legs off. Pulled out. After line. Still, I'm not where is he now? Where about? Where is he? He swims on the ship. You bet it would have be quiet. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Let he have rise again upon his mark. The ship. The ship. Dash on my men. Will ye not save my ship?
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Straight up on the advancing prow, the Pequod drove Moby Dick, smiting his jaw amid fiery showers of foam. On the ship's deck stood starbuck and sea drenched stuff, rescued from the wreckage of the rescued from the wreckage of the stove boats. The mastheads screamed a warning. They turned and caught sight of the down coming monster.
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The where? The wheel? How can I tell that Dutch Starbuck tie a thigh must in a woman's painting pit? Abhand me, fool. This jars are often the jar. Oh, he hablows thy work. Steady, Huntsman. Steady. Up hills again. He turns to me that his brow dried on. May God stand by me now.
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The sullen white buttress of the whale's forehead smoked the ship's starboard bow till men and timbers breathe. Through the breach, they heard the waters pour as mountain torrents and a flute. Slowly, slowly, the ship settled in the water. The whale lay quiet within the few yards of Ahab's tiny advancing boat.
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Thou firm, death's glorious ship. Must ye then perish and without me? O lonely death. O lonely life. Moby jig, towards thee I roll. Thou all destroying but un conquering wail. To the last I grapple with thee. Keep roast, captain. One more pull drum in. Steady off. From hell's heart I stab at thee. For hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee. Let die while chasing thee. Tie to thee, thou cursed whale. Thus, I give up this fear. Captain, he's sounding. Captain, the line is found. Catch you once again around the post. The line. Captain, what you do, captain?
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Caught by a flying turn around the neck, the singing whale line shot him over the side. And down, down through the swirling depths, sank Maddy Hammond. Down to the silent rest he yearned for, still seeking Moby Dick, following the mighty white whale to the quiet darkness below. And now, concentric circles seize the lone boat itself as the greater bulk of the ship settled into the sea. And all the crew and each floating all lance poles spinning all together animate and inanimate all round and round in one vortex, sank downward, carrying the smallest ship of the Pequod out of sight.
Now, small fowls grew screaming over the yet yawning gulf. A sullen white surf beat against its steep sides. Then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago. The drama's done. Why then here does anyone step forth? Because one did survive the wreck. I, Ishmael, floated in the wreckage at the margin of the vortex. And when the half spent suction of the ship reached me and drew me round and round to the center of the slowly wheeling circle, it had subsided to a creamy pool. Clinging to a shattered boat, I floated on the soft and dirge like make.
On the second day, a sail grew nearer, nearer, and picked me up at last. It was the Rachel that in her retracing search after her missing children, only found another orphan.
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So ends Moby Dick by the great American novelist, Fermin Melville. Today and last week, the Columbia workshop presented this classic of the seas in two parts as adapted by Ernest Kanoa and directed by Howard G. Barnes. The musical score was composed by Norman Lockwood and conducted by Frederick Steiner. Included in the cast were Sydney Smith as Ishmael, Neil O'Malley was Ahab, and Charles Irving was Starbuck. Next week over most of these same CBS stations, the Columbia workshop will present an original fantasy by Joseph Lusco entitled Lee Fountain Comes of Age, which will be directed by Werner Michel with a special musical score by Alexander Semler.
Saturday night is good listening with CBS, so listen now over most of these same stations to the famous correspondent Larry LeSueur in the news. He'll be with you in a moment. This is Don Baker for CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.
The Columbia workshop, radio's foremost laboratory of writing and production techniques presents the second and concluding part of a two part adaptation of the great American classic of the sea, Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Ernest Kanoy adapted the novel for the Columbia workshop and the special musical score was composed by Norman Lockwood and is conducted by Frederick Steiner. The program is directed by Howard G. Barnes. The iron well of Captain Ahab drives the whaling ship Pequod forward ever forward, weary month after weary month, in mad pursuit of the fabulous white whale Moby Dick. The officers and crew grumble and dream of home, but cannot bend the single purpose of the revenge obsessed tyrant.
Captain Ahab walks the decks of the Pequod with an ivory stump where Moby Dick took off his leg when last they met. The tale is told by Ishmael.
[00:01:38] Unknown:
Pray, gaunt Ahab pacing the tilting quarter deck. His slim white ivory leg pounding in eternal thumping rhythm, searching, hunting the enemy that robbed him of his leg. Across the storm tossed ocean round the horn through the Indian seas and out upon the broad Pacific. Close on the foam thrashed wake of Moby Dick, a monstrous white whale. To Ehab's unhinged fire, the focus and embodiment of infinite malignant evil. Just as the unsettling polar star, so Ahab's purpose gleamed down on a constant midnight of the ship's gloomy crew. In this foreshadowing interval, all humor vanished.
Starbuck the maid smiled no more and stubbed the second officer stilled his cheerful song. Like machines, they dumbly moved on deck. Ever conscious of the old man's desperate eye was on them.
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If they have, sir, we must send down the main tops of the yard. Strike sail, mister Stapleton. I assure the e lift is half stranded. Shall I strike it, sir? Quite nothing. I should. If I had sky some poles, I'd sway them up now and carry double canvas. We're on his tail, Saver. We close all day on Moby Dick. Double canvas in a gale, sir. It is madness at me. Aye, stalwart mad demoniac. Thou dost abhor thy captain's army. But stubbeth Marty and stubbeth Will or Rahab. My magnet at thy brain draws off rebellion. Insane old man, beware thyself. Hark ye, sabote. We strike no sail nor short and canvas. And out of the typhoon sweeps away the mast until the masthead cries out for Moby Dick, until he spouts black wood.
And in this hand, I clutch his evil heart.
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And when the seas had calmed again in the summer cool weather of these latitudes, the open sunbeat deck invited Perp, the blacksmith. And he rigged his forge lashed tight to ring bolts in the deck. Surrounded by an eager circle all waiting to be served, he mended boats, babes, pike heads, harpoons, and lances. He worked in a shower of darting sparks that sprayed round him in thick hovering
[00:04:10] Unknown:
flight. My father was the keeper of the Eddystone light. He married a mermaid one fine night. Out of his union there came three. The two was vicious. The other was me. Ho ho ho. The wind blows free. Oh, for the life on the roving sea. Excellent. Excellent.
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Them without a scorch. Because I am scorched all over, captain. Not easily canst thou scorch a scar. What wilst thou making there? Well, they get old pike head, sir. There was seams and dents in it. And canst thou make it all smooth again, blacksmith,
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after such hard usage as it had? I think so, sir. How canst smooth seams and dents no matter how hard the metal? Aye, sir. All seams and dents but one. Look ye here then. Here. Can ye smooth out the wrinkled seam of madness in my brow? If thou couldst, blacksmith, latten up what I lay my head upon the anvil and feel thy heaviest hammer between my eyes. Answer, havest thou smoothed this seam? Nay, sir.
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That is the one dent insensible of like Smith's hammer. Aye, man. It is unsmoothable.
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For though thou sees it here in my flesh, it has worked down into the bone of my skull. But no more of pikes and gaps today. Look to here, blacksmith. Steel, gabbard nail stubs of shoes of racing horses.
[00:05:53] Unknown:
Aye, captain Ahab. Thou hast there the best and stubbornest stuff we work. Aye, perp.
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And thou must forge me a harpoon. A thousand yokes of fiends could not pass. A blade that'll stick in a whale like his own pin bone. Forge me that blade, and it'll break the blood of Moby
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Dick.
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Through the tropic afternoon, the blacksmith heated and hammered the stubborn steel. And wildly had peace beside the forge and fixed the blade with greedy eyes. Then as the sun sank down beyond the yard, the blacksmith
[00:06:41] Unknown:
but for the tempering, will you shove the water cast, Neil? No. No. No water.
[00:06:45] Unknown:
I want it of the true death temper. Hi there. I say go. I go. Quick, quick. What say you, you pagan harpooners? Will you give me as much blood as will cover this bar? Blood? Blood? Aye. Aye. Blood. For a true temper. For a blade as sharp as the needle's sleet of the icy sea. Aye, captain. I'm willing. Aye, captain. Your arms, then. And with the knife. Watch, Tango. Tango. Quick, Greg. Now then, put ye your arms over this hot blade and turn them. There. Tempered in blood, ye harpoon. Baptized in the name of the devil. Mohave dick. I hold thy death.
And now I'll drink thy heart's blood and see thee roll. Hey, now.
[00:07:45] Unknown:
Down swept the Pequod on the line, the cruising ground across the Equator, flooring for whales, rocking in the tiny boats on a slow heaving swell. But warmest climbs but nurse the cruelest fangs. Sky is the most intelligent, but fast get the deadliest thunders. And from out that cloudless sky burst the direst of all storms, the typhoon. By evening, the peak quad tone of a canvas and bear poles struggle as sky and sea roar. The burial attempt.
[00:08:44] Unknown:
Stop. Go. Hi, mister Dava. Come out. Oh, double dash. Stop my singing in the world but to cut my throat, and then can the one that sing you the doxology for a rhino. Foster, listen to see it. In the dark with the Pacific brand on my floor. Look. Yeah. The gale comes full against the course we steer for Moby Dick. There in the lightning. Marking half full. Here. The book's dropping. I fresh in the stern sheets where the old man stands. Now stop jump over, lord, and sing if thou must. I don't watch in the wind. A gale that hammers us now. We can turn it to a fair wind to drive home. Yonder the windward, all is black as a doom.
But lowered away from Moby Dick is home. Oh, god. Turn us back to Nantucket and home. Go. Aye, captain. Come not about right into it. Hey, captain. Let me square the odds where we may and make a fair voyage of it homeless. At first, Starbuck. I'll cut down the first to cast you, sir. Robson. Too long to hunt the white whales are as binding as mine own. Hey, Starbucks. We ride into the typhoon. But the anchors are working, sir. Can I get them inboard? Sir, nothing but lash everything. The wind rises. Thick and sheet work. I mass and keels. You take thee for the hunchback skippers coast and smacks. Send down the sails.
No. No.
[00:11:08] Unknown:
Next morning, the sea rolled in long, slow billows, and striving in the pequod gurgling track, pushed her on like giant palms outstretched. The sea was as a crucible of molten gold that bubblingly leaps with light and heat. And then, splitting the lazy silence, the masked head cries. On the horizon, mister Gansal just visible over the saucer of ocean, a large ship, the Rachel, bore down directly on the Pequod, her spas thick flake clustering with men. The Rachel's captain put off, and soon his boat hook clinched the Pequod main chain.
[00:11:57] Unknown:
Uhoy there. I've seen the white whale. Hey. Yesterday. Get behind up here. Yes, sir. Up.
[00:12:06] Unknown:
Ever seen a whale boat adrift? Nay. But the white whale, was he killed? Moby Dick still lives. He does. You've not seen a whale boat adrift? It was yesterday the cursed white whale ran off with our lead boat fast to him, flowed out of sight in less than an hour. Eight good men save them. You'd stop in the height of the season for one missing boat. My boy, my own boy is among them. For love of heavy captain, try to split forty hours. Let me charter your ship to help the search. I'll pay and roundly pay. His son, captain Ahab. We'll save his son?
[00:12:42] Unknown:
Nay, sir. Nay?
[00:12:43] Unknown:
I am not cold. Would you say hi to me? I lay captain. You've got a boy home now. Yes. You'll relent. I can see it. Come then, men.
[00:12:53] Unknown:
Stand by to spare the yards in the air. That's not a rope you're on. Captain, I will not do it even though I lose time. Goodbye. God bless your man, and may I forgive myself. Mister Starbuck. Aye, sir. Three minutes hence. Race forward and have the ship sail on. I say I beg. I plead my son, captain. Mister Starbuck, pin sail upon the wake of Moby Dick.
[00:13:30] Unknown:
Soon, the two ships diverged their wakes. As long as the strange vessel was in sight, she yawed hither and thither. And by her winding woeful way, you plainly saw that this ship that was so weeping with spray still remained without comfort. She was Rachel who wept for her children because they were
[00:13:55] Unknown:
not.
[00:14:00] Unknown:
The days went by, and the Pequod rose and fell heavily with every wave. And Ahab, driven by the fire within him, strode the deck with restless urgency.
[00:14:13] Unknown:
Starbuck. Aye, sir. Oh, Starbuck. The mild, mild wind and gentle sky. On such a day as this, I struck my first swell. 18, I was. Forty forty years to ago. A long time, captain. And not three years ashore. Curb, weariness. Four years on dry, salted fare, fit emblem of the dry nourishment of my soul. Thou art married? I, a young girl, but a wife, rather a widow whose husband lives. I widowed that girl when I married her, Stavoc. Olde have more a demon than a man. By this strife, this chase, how richer or better is Ahab now, dismasted, and I've repaid a proper stump.
I feel deadly bowed and humps. Though I were Adam staggering beneath the pile centuries in paradise. Captain, the wind blows to Nantucket. Stand close, Stavit. Let me look into a human eye. I see my wife and child in thine eye. Stabbath, do thou stay on board the Pequod. Lower not when I do. When Brandon Ahab gives chase to Moby Dick, that hazard shall not be thine. Captain, noble soul, why should anyone give chase to that hated fish? No, Sabot. Away. Let us fly those deadly waters. Let us home. Wife and child too are mild. Let the alter course have impact my heart, stave my brain, mockery, bitter mockery. Let me square, captain. How cheerily would we bow on our way to see old Nantucket again.
All the mild blue days like this one on Nantucket Island. Aye. And about this time, the boy awakes, sits up in bed, and his mother speaks of Ahab, a broad on the deep, who will yet be home again. 'Tis my Mary, my Mary herself. She promised every morning would my son be carried to the highest hill to catch first glimpse of his father's sail. What is it, Starbot? What cruel and hidden lord is he that orders me against all natural lovings and longings? Is Ahab Ahab? Is it I or God or who that lifts this arm? Like hidden men, we'll turn round and round like yonder windlass and face the hand spike.
But we'll sleep at last, darling. I cling to that. We'll sleep at last. Home, captain. Home. Change the course. Speak back to home. Thy wife, thy child, they? Where are they? All Aye, sir. Stand by. Let go. Keep the ship, sir. Aye, sir. Go lower, sir. Now, men, un ship your oil. Oil. Now then, fool. Blast you. Beat me on the back of Moby Dick. I seething out. Fool.
[00:18:38] Unknown:
The ocean grew smooth, and now they saw him wallowing in the trough. His dazzling hump visible sliding along the sea. His tiny malignant eye fixed out over the waves. His massive wrinkled forehead towering over the swells. Seabirds roosted on his craggy head. So swam a Into the churning seas spilled Ahab as the whale jaws crushed the frail gunwales and sliced the boat in two. Withdrawn from his prey, Moby Dick now laid a little distance. Swiftly and round he swam churning the water in his wenchful wake, barring from the floating wrecking other boats till down upon the circle of boats and the maddened whale bore the pequan, close upon the maelstrom that battered swimming in.
They fished up floating mariners and shattered whaling gear. And then, Old Ahab dragged from the sea, stood again on his quarter deck. The morning of the third day dawned fair and fresh. And once more, the lookout started every masthead and almost every spar. Time itself now held long breaths with keen suspense. Hours passed. Gold beaten out to ages.
[00:21:01] Unknown:
Upon this earth. Aye, sir. Thou wilt have it so. Some men die at it tight. Robert. Some at low water and some at the full of the flood. Shake hands with me now, man. Oh, captain. Captain, go not. Go not. Man your boats. Stand by the crew. Oh, Arthur, you're off steel. What is this that shoots through me and leaves me so deadly calm and expectant, fixed at the top of a shutter? Merry girl, thou padest before me. Cast her thyself, Starbucks. Take it off. Oh, I have. I have. Shudder, old man. The rest brought down death upon us.
[00:21:53] Unknown:
The whale boats rocked slowly where the spouting Moby Dick had sounded, waiting till he should rise and blow again. Suddenly, the waters around them slowly swelled in broad circles and quickly appeared. A low grumbling sound, a subterranean hub, and shrouded in a thin drooping veil of mist, fast form shot lengthwise from the sea.
[00:22:19] Unknown:
She reaches She reaches back. She reaches back. Give away. Backwater off. He cuts that boat, captain, and the other. Which do we pick him up, captain? Hey, nay. Please still boat, and Moby Dick lies two boat legs off. Pulled out. After line. Still, I'm not where is he now? Where about? Where is he? He swims on the ship. You bet it would have be quiet. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Ours. Let he have rise again upon his mark. The ship. The ship. Dash on my men. Will ye not save my ship?
[00:23:36] Unknown:
Straight up on the advancing prow, the Pequod drove Moby Dick, smiting his jaw amid fiery showers of foam. On the ship's deck stood starbuck and sea drenched stuff, rescued from the wreckage of the rescued from the wreckage of the stove boats. The mastheads screamed a warning. They turned and caught sight of the down coming monster.
[00:23:51] Unknown:
The where? The wheel? How can I tell that Dutch Starbuck tie a thigh must in a woman's painting pit? Abhand me, fool. This jars are often the jar. Oh, he hablows thy work. Steady, Huntsman. Steady. Up hills again. He turns to me that his brow dried on. May God stand by me now.
[00:24:18] Unknown:
The sullen white buttress of the whale's forehead smoked the ship's starboard bow till men and timbers breathe. Through the breach, they heard the waters pour as mountain torrents and a flute. Slowly, slowly, the ship settled in the water. The whale lay quiet within the few yards of Ahab's tiny advancing boat.
[00:24:46] Unknown:
Thou firm, death's glorious ship. Must ye then perish and without me? O lonely death. O lonely life. Moby jig, towards thee I roll. Thou all destroying but un conquering wail. To the last I grapple with thee. Keep roast, captain. One more pull drum in. Steady off. From hell's heart I stab at thee. For hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee. Let die while chasing thee. Tie to thee, thou cursed whale. Thus, I give up this fear. Captain, he's sounding. Captain, the line is found. Catch you once again around the post. The line. Captain, what you do, captain?
[00:25:58] Unknown:
Caught by a flying turn around the neck, the singing whale line shot him over the side. And down, down through the swirling depths, sank Maddy Hammond. Down to the silent rest he yearned for, still seeking Moby Dick, following the mighty white whale to the quiet darkness below. And now, concentric circles seize the lone boat itself as the greater bulk of the ship settled into the sea. And all the crew and each floating all lance poles spinning all together animate and inanimate all round and round in one vortex, sank downward, carrying the smallest ship of the Pequod out of sight.
Now, small fowls grew screaming over the yet yawning gulf. A sullen white surf beat against its steep sides. Then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago. The drama's done. Why then here does anyone step forth? Because one did survive the wreck. I, Ishmael, floated in the wreckage at the margin of the vortex. And when the half spent suction of the ship reached me and drew me round and round to the center of the slowly wheeling circle, it had subsided to a creamy pool. Clinging to a shattered boat, I floated on the soft and dirge like make.
On the second day, a sail grew nearer, nearer, and picked me up at last. It was the Rachel that in her retracing search after her missing children, only found another orphan.
[00:28:31] Unknown:
So ends Moby Dick by the great American novelist, Fermin Melville. Today and last week, the Columbia workshop presented this classic of the seas in two parts as adapted by Ernest Kanoa and directed by Howard G. Barnes. The musical score was composed by Norman Lockwood and conducted by Frederick Steiner. Included in the cast were Sydney Smith as Ishmael, Neil O'Malley was Ahab, and Charles Irving was Starbuck. Next week over most of these same CBS stations, the Columbia workshop will present an original fantasy by Joseph Lusco entitled Lee Fountain Comes of Age, which will be directed by Werner Michel with a special musical score by Alexander Semler.
Saturday night is good listening with CBS, so listen now over most of these same stations to the famous correspondent Larry LeSueur in the news. He'll be with you in a moment. This is Don Baker for CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.
Introduction to Moby Dick Adaptation
Captain Ahab's Obsession
The Blacksmith's Forge
The Typhoon and Ahab's Resolve
The Encounter with the Rachel
Ahab's Reflection and Starbuck's Plea
The Final Confrontation with Moby Dick
The Aftermath and Ishmael's Survival
Conclusion and Credits
