Call Me Ishmaelle

<p><b><i>Moby-Dick</i> reimagined from the perspective of a cross-dressed female sailor</b><br><br><b>'Brilliantly written... ambitious, brave, strange' Philip Hoare<br>'One of the most valuable writers in the world' Deborah Levy</b><br><br>1843. Ishmaelle is born in a small village on the stormy Kent coast where she grows up swimming with dolphins. After her parents and infant sister die, her brother, Joseph, leaves to find work as a sailor. Abandoned and desperate for a life at sea, Ishmaelle disguises herself as a cabin boy and travels to New York.<br><br><i>Call Me Ishmaelle</i> reimagines the epic battle between man and nature in Herman Melville’s <i>Moby Dick </i>from a female perspective. As the American Civil War breaks out in 1861, Ishmaelle boards the Nimrod, a whaling ship led by the obsessive Captain Seneca, a Black free man of heroic stature who is haunted by a tragic past. Here, she finds protectors in Polynesian harpooner, Kauri, and Taoist monk, Muzi, whose readings of the I-Ching guide their quest.<br><br>Through the bloody male violence of whaling, and the unveiling of her feminine identity, Ishmaelle realises there is a mysterious bond between herself and the mythical white whale, Moby Dick. Xiaolu Guo has crafted a dramatically different, feminist narrative that stands alongside the original while offering a powerful exploration of nature, gender and human purpose.</p>