Happy Birthday, Herman!
In honor of Herman Melville's birthday today, August 1, I'm posting one of my favorite descriptions of Queequeg and his tattoos... Just another reason why my blog is so named...
Queequeg's "tattooing had been the work of a departed prophet and seer of his island, who, by those hieroglyphic marks, had written out on his body a complete theory of the heavens and the earth, and a mystical treatise on the art of attaining truth; so that Queequeg in his own proper person was a riddle to unfold; a wondrous work in one volume; but whose mysteries not even himself could read, though his own live heart beat against them; and these mysteries were therefore destined in the end to moulder away with the living parchment whereon they were inscribed, and so be unsolved to the last."
Here's to all the sweet mysteries of the world which will forever remain unpainted and unsolved to the last...
Happy Birthday, HM.
Queequeg's "tattooing had been the work of a departed prophet and seer of his island, who, by those hieroglyphic marks, had written out on his body a complete theory of the heavens and the earth, and a mystical treatise on the art of attaining truth; so that Queequeg in his own proper person was a riddle to unfold; a wondrous work in one volume; but whose mysteries not even himself could read, though his own live heart beat against them; and these mysteries were therefore destined in the end to moulder away with the living parchment whereon they were inscribed, and so be unsolved to the last."
Here's to all the sweet mysteries of the world which will forever remain unpainted and unsolved to the last...
Happy Birthday, HM.
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