What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it; what cozening, hidden lord and master, and cruel, remorseless emperor commands me; that against all natural lovings and longings, I so keep pushing, and crowding and jamming myself on all the time?
— Captain Ahab

Melville's great white whale haunts the American imagination. Since publication in 1851, the novel has challenged readers, inspired artists, and created an American archetype - the tragic figure of Captain Ahab, trapped in his obsessive quest for the unobtainable.

Winter Weekend 2000 participants explored the world of 19th-century whaling and the world of Herman Melville, a writer who transcends his own time– and ours. Experts from the fields of maritime history, art, literature, and New England Studies engaged the group of 100 readers in lively discussion and debate. A New England boiled dinner set the scene for an evening with Jim Millinger appearing as "Jimmy" Whittier or Cornville, Somerset County, Maine, a "sometime 19th century whaleman. Presenters included Joseph Conforti, University of Southern Maine; Christoph Irmscher, Harvard University; Laurie Robertson-Lorant, author of Melville; A Biography; Donna Cassidy, University of Southern Maine; Sean Todd, College of the Atlantic, Robert Webb, former curator of the Maine Maritime Museum. Participants enjoyed an exhibit of early and illustrated editions of the work of Herman Melville and an original Rockwell Kent drawing used in a classic edition of Moby-Dick.