'Moby Dick,' originally published in 1851, is the epic saga of a one-legged fanatic, Captain Ahab, who swears vengeance on the mammoth white whale that has crippled him. The first American novel to win a place in the literature of the world, it has been called a realistic story of whaling, a romance of unusual adventure and weird characters, a symbolic allegory, a drama of heroic determination and conflict.
