• RustyEarthfire@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    At the risk of stating the well-known, Khan’s line references Moby Dick:

    He tasks me; he heaps me; I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it.

    and:

    Aye, aye! and I’ll chase him round Good Hope, and round the Horn, and round the Norway Maelstrom, and round perdition’s flames before I give him up.

      • gregorum
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        8 months ago

        when Chekov is in the Botany Bay cargo carriers/shelters and looks at the bookshelf, there’s a very conspicuously-placed copy of Moby Dick sitting there.

      • uid0gid0@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        As Kahn is activating the Genesis device he directly quotes Ahab from chapter 135, starting with “to the last…”

        Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee.

        • weariedfae@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Reading the text of Moby Dick? Okay, cool.

          Hearing it performed by Ricardo Montalban? Some of the best goddamn poetic prose ever.

      • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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        8 months ago

        Kahn read Moby Dick, was in the habit of quoting it, completely missed the point of the book.

        I’m laughing at the ‘superior intellect.’

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
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          8 months ago

          Hey man, tell it to Spock. He’s the one who called Khan “quite intelligent,” which is not exactly something he’d say about most of his fellow crew.

          Of course, Khan then proved himself to be a complete idiot afterward, so maybe it’s just that Spock is a poor judge of these things. Maybe McCoy was the genius all along.