147. Moby Dick and Modernism with Ayad Rahmani
Original Drawing by Tori Haynes
Today we are joined with Ayad Rahmani who teaches architecture at Washington State University. Rahmani's love for literature and architecture leads us to today's conversation about Moby Dick and architecture.
Timestamp Outline
2:11 Literature and Architecture
3:13 Christopher Alexander
Deep Structure: Hertzberger
3:43 Why literature and architecture?
4:11 “Architecture without a story is a meaningless pile of stone, concrete, and glass” AR
5:17 Why are you obsessed with these novels and why do you think it has something to do with architecture?
5:22 Franz Kafka
Moby Dick
6:30 Escape your history and destiny, become your own person.
Moby Dick, Captain Ahab, and the Pequod
8:04 Why are you after a perfect white whale? What is it to you?
Making your own destiny: “This is straight up modernist thinking” VP
9:02 Le Corbusier changed his name to rewrite his history with his father
9:31 Modern architecture is the Pequod, and the modernists are Pequodians seeking to transcend their beginnings
10:11 “Trickery against history. History, if left alone, will triumph over you and subdue you” AR
13:13 The parallel of Moby Dick to colonization: “Colonization was a mission to exploit the colonies, but they sold it as a civilizing mission” VP
15:05 Alexis de Tocqueville
“The American Experiment is a con-job “
Retaining power in the high class of American democracy
15:50 Is Melville’s position in Moby Dick the same as Tocqueville?
16:31 Ishmael survives, and he lives to tell the story. He is Melville, a theorist, an observer, and a thinker.
17:40 The topic of forgiveness: Ishmael forgiving his father to triumph him.
Forgiveness means more to the self than to the other person
20:25 “Forgiveness is about overcoming ones own unforgiving-ness, and a triumph over oneself” VP
23:43 “Ahab is you and me. We can’t forgive. Ishmael is God. He’s the modernish prophet of objectivity” VP
24:27 “Ahab’s demise is his unwillingness and inability to let go of revenge” AR
26:14 Tocqueville says “The early American Experiment is a con-job, but Melville wants to believe in it. We want it to work out even though we know it’s messed up”
27:50 Planetary and climate crisis movement
32:33 What is Ahab’s new “syllabus”? How do you become a self-destiny modernist? What are the new requirements to capture Moby Dick?
35:33 Michel Foucault - Normalcy is the enlightenment project by producing abnormal spaces
35:48 Starbuck
36:47 Starbuck reminding Captain Ahab that there are better things out there than getting his revenge is a parallel of Starbuck giving reminders of the joys of conforming to patriarchy
38:26 How does Ahab prepare everybody to search for the big whale?
39:21 Nehru : A Tryst with Destiny
39:35 “Tricking everyone into making this normal and believing that the Moby Dick will be one more, but the big mission is to transcend oneself” VP
41:13 Standing in the way of Ahab’s passivity is Starbuck. Even though Starbuck is fully capable of rebelling against the captain, he doesn’t” AR
42:13 The Shackleton Story
42:39 “Everyone wants to be Shackleton of Ahab and escape the tug of convention and build their own destiny, but are too scared of what Starbuck says: a disaster” VP
43:38 Was Ahab greedy?
Napoleon
45:41 “There’s something in me that I can do to improve humanity” AR
46:28 “Talk about it, shout about it when you have to choose. Any way you look at it, you lose” VP
Krishna
48:34 The miracles between Ishmael and Jesus
52:03 “Modernism doesn’t accept gods, modernism accepts prophets” VP
53:42 Ishmael forms community because everyone recognizes in themselves their failure to do what Ishmael is able to do, therefore they identify in him
55:08 “Frank Lloyd Wright’s version of miracles were to defy gravity” - AR
55:41 Falling Water
56:10 Johnson Wax Headquarters
58:47 Two methodologies: to persuade people to follow by performing miracles, and to believe in hopelessness but take things one step at a time
1:01:00 The climate crisis: “Time is ticking” AR
1:01:15 Le Corbusier vs. Jane Jacobs
1:04:38 Grass roots work vs. Big-picture thinking
1:04:43 Why does the ship go down in Moby Dick? The big-picture thinking loses
1:05:16 Mary Shelley
Tower of Babel
1:08:03 “These harpoons aren’t gonna do much to me, I’m bigger than them” AR
1:09:25 How does he die? Moby Dick is a cautionary tale
1:10:17 Ishmael and the coffin: the coffin now becomes the saving tool
1:12:21 The only mention of women in Moby Dick is through Starbuck: “If you want the comfort of a woman, you’re gonna lose it while seeking revenge”
1:14:11 Friedrich Nietzsche
1:14:46 Why are you so obsessed with Moby Dick? What is your “Moby Dick”?
