The Quarter Deck Analysis Transcendentalism is a philosophy that emphasizes conditions of knowledge through experience; also the philosophy of truth and respect for nature and the inner spirit. Thoreau and Emerson are the two most influential writers of transcendentalist movement. Anti-transcendentalism is transposed in Ahab of Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick. Ahab is an extremely obsessive person. He is obsessive about his own power and supremacy over both mankind and nature. Ahab displays overzealous obsession …showed first 75 words of 669 total…

…showed last 75 words of 669 total…with the force which created him and all of mankind. Ahab relies on the experience he does not have with God and nature to deduce that he is at the very least an equal of both of the universe’s strongest powers. Ahab is the perfect antitheses of transcendentalism he thrives on the obsessions that blanket his life. He also, is an ignorant man incapable of comprehending the beauty and majesty he is surrounded by.