All Astir

All Astir Gems and jewels let them heap— Wax sumptuous as the Sophi: For me, to grapple from Art’s deep One dripping trophy! —”In a Garret” W e have not just one dripping trophy to display. The chests of “Extracts” are unusually full of treasure in this issue. Such a wealth of offerings and the evidence they afford of our diverse and far-flung friends and correspondents give lively signs of global interest in this particular nineteenth-century author. As we have done in the past, we continue to feature occasional public lectures delivered at our gatherings. We are delighted to reprint Carolyn Karcher’s lecture. “The Pleasures of Reading Moby-Dick,” presented at the Melville Society Lecture at the Moby-Dick Marathon reading, January 3, at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. We also present a cornucopia of Melville Society news and information, with our officers’ reports from Executive Secretary Mary K. Bercaw Edwards and Treasurer John Matteson. Mary K. Bercaw Edwards has provided a complete list of the past officers and committees of the Society since its inception; John Matteson offers a thorough analysis of the Society’s funds and their performance in the unsteady markets of 2007; and we have included a copy of the Society’s bylaws, recently revised by the Executive Committee and accepted by a vote of the membership. Here at a glance you may get a sense of how extensively the Society has grown since 1945, how carefully it has preserved its financial legacy, and how thoughtfully it has reconceived its structure and workings to meet the challenges of a new century. On a more sobering note, we have received a letter from T. Walter Herbert on the disappearance of a promising Iraqui scholar with whom he had been corresponding. It is a reminder of the larger world beyond the borders of our pages. On March 7, 2008, the New Bedford Whaling Museum hosted a legislative hearing on Bill H3964, “An Act Establishing Moby-Dick as the Official Book of the Commonwealth,” State Representative Antonio Cabral presiding. A group of fifth-graders in Pittsfield, Massachusetts initiated this measure in order to promote a favorite local author and to learn something about the legislative process; two fifth-grade classes from New Bedford schools attended the hearing, and nearly a dozen students testified in favor of an act that would C
2008 The Authors Journal compilation C
2008 The Melville Society and Wiley Periodicals, Inc. 102 L E V I A T H A N A J O U R N A L O F M E L V I L L E S T U D I E S A L L A S T I R honor the whaling history of New Bedford, as well as Melville’s great book. It appears that the next generation of Melville scholars may potentially come of age in a state where Moby-Dick gets handed out with pads, pencils, and crayons, or the free laptops of the future. —Wyn Kelley New Bedford fifth-graders testify on a bill to make Moby-Dick the state book of Massachusetts. A J O U R N A L O F M E L V I L L E S T U D I E S 103 ...