Fast Fish-Loose Fish Doctrine in Moby Dick

Moby Dick is a well-known novel in which Herman Melville depicts the story of Ahab, a captain of the Pequod. Captain Ahab journeys over oceans in search of an enormous white whale, for the reason that Moby Dick bit off one of Ahab’s legs and he is seeking revenge. Herman Melville uses recurring images, motifs and deep meanings of the passage to enhance the tone and theme of the novel Moby Dick.
The strong use of recurring images and motifs assists in developing the tone and theme of Moby Dick. In the selected passage, Melville’s commentary is shown through vivid metaphors. One example of a metaphor is seen when he discusses Mordecai. Melville describes Mordecai as being a Fast-Fish. The doctrine of the Fast-Fish Loose-Fish is a dogma which Melville depicts the lives of men and women who may or may not be extravagant, yet they all have conflicts that separate them into one of two categories: either a “fast fish” or a “loose fish”. A Loose-Fish is described as a f...