Moby-Dick (1851-2012)

161st anniversary of Moby-Dick (source)

Well, what's the report? said Peleg when I came back; “What did ye see?”

“Not much,” I replied—"nothing but water; considerable horizon though, and there's a squall coming up, I think” [1]

—Herman Melville, 1851

He had bought a large map representing the sea,

Without the least vestige of land:

And the crew were much pleased when they found it to be

A map they could all understand. [2]

—Lewis Carroll, 1876

It is the void, the great blank emptiness out of which we miraculously emerged; by which we will ultimately be devoured; through which the absurd galaxies spiral and drift endlessly on their nonsense voyages from nowhere to nowhere. [3]

—Martin Gardner, 1962

[1] Moby Dick, Northwestern University Press, Evanston, IL, 1988, p. 72 

[2] The Hunting of the Snark: An agony in Eight Fits, The University of Adelaide, South Australia. (“The Bellman's speech”, retrieved on October 18, 2012 from the e-book)

[3] The annotated Snark; the full text of Lewis Carroll's great nonsense epic, the hunting of the snark, Penguin Books, Bungay, 1979, p.28 (retrieved on October 18, 2012)

Read more:
Martin Gardner
Under the LobsterScope
Empty Maps 
The Mirage of History
Robert Smithson 
Map of Clear Broken Glass (Atlantis)