Have been too busy to post this friday and yesterday but IT’S FEDALLAH TIME!!!!!!!!! THIS WEEK’S PAGE WAS FEDALLAH TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
copying over today’s blog post from the comic site, because i think it’s important! it’s long, because u know how i ramble when it comes to these guys 💖, but again, i think it’s important:
God I have so so many thoughts about Fedallah. Before everything else, it’s VERY important that you know that he is my Favorite Fucking Guy and I Love him So Fucking Much and he Means SO fucking much to me. But anyway!
I’m going to copy a lot of my thoughts here over from the notes of a fic chapter of mine where I talk about Fedallah:
There are, of course, many, many issues with the way Melville portrays Fedallah in the book. He is a horrifically racist and Orientalist stereotype. Just one of these issues is the fact that Fedallah is given a number of conflicting, racist, and caricaturized racial/cultural markers. The descriptor he most often gets is “Parsee,” so we at least know that much about him. Throughout the book, he’s also described as having "swart" (dark) skin and being an "eboness" (another racist way to describe dark/Black skin), but he is also lumped into descriptors of his "tiger-yellow crew," wears a "rumpled Chinese jacket," wears a "glistening white plaited turban, the living hair braided and coiled round and round upon his head," is accompanied by a crew of Filipino oarsmen, and has an Arabic name. The only thing we know for certain about him is the only consistent descriptor he gets: Parsee.
“Parsee” loosely means Persian, and is largely associated particularly with Zoroastrians. Today, the word "Parsi" specifically describes the group of Zoroastrians in India who are descended from Zoroastrians who fled Persia starting a couple centuries after Muslim rule in Persia (there are other nuances and names used to describe different groups of Indian Zoroastrians, who migrated throughout the centuries since then, but this is just a large summary). Persians in India (and elsewhere) had long been referred to as "Parsees" before this, and so this group picked up that moniker over history. In the early modern period (aka starting the 16th century), though, there are also several examples of European travellers and writers in general using "Parsee" to refer to Zoroastrians still in Iran as well -- the term was used to denote Zoroastrians generally, whether referring to the group in Iran or in India. In the Western consciousness of the time, as far as I can tell, "Parsee" just means "Zoroastrian."
So all that in mind, Fedallah could plausibly be either a Zoroastrian from Persia, or from India. I personally have chosen to make him Persian for a few reasons, a) because i'm persian <3 b) because I am far more familiar with Persian history broadly, and am extensively researched in Persian Zoroastrian history (…i did get really autistically special interested in this. like. more than 1200+ pages of research i’ve read glsdfdklsfja) c) i think there can be Some argument made that Melville thinks of "Parsee" as "Persian" specifically. He refers to "Persian fire worshippers" in Ch 42 and 86 (which, Zoroastrians are not 'fire worshippers;’ this is a common Orientalist stereotype and misconception both within and outside of Iran/India which Zoroastrians today are STILL fighting — but it IS what Melville would have thought/read/been told they were). Melville has Ahab say the following in Ch 199 The Candles: “Oh! thou clear spirit of clear fire, whom on these seas I as Persian once did worship, till in the sacramental act so burned by thee...", which ties into some of the WEIRD stuff Melville seems to have going on with Fedallah and Ahab and the implication that Fedallah is Corrupting Ahab or pulling Ahab into Fedallah's sinful/devilish desires…etc etc. (Which, also, sidebar, Ahab calls himself Persian here! “I as Persian”!!! really weird and interesting!! no I don’t think Melville necessarily is actually writing Ahab as a Persian Person (that’s what I’m doing); I think he’s being weird and racist and Orientalist about Ahab being figuratively ~~persian~~ aka mystical and strange and demonic and whatever else, but still really interesting!!) There is a very particular and horrible kind of Orientalism going on here that I don't Reaaaaally have the desire to get into right now.
But point being, I think you could make the textual argument that Melville sees "Parsee" Fedallah as specifically one of the Persian "Fire-worshippers" (Zoroastrians) that he continually references. Melville was a well-read individual, and there was by the time of Moby Dick an already long history of Western (particularly European) scholars being ~fascinated~ by the mysterious “fire worshippers” of ancient Persia; there is a LOT of contemporaneous writing about the Zoroastrians (both Indian and Persian), in the way that much of the “Orient” and its religions were ~fascinating~ to Europeans. (again, I must stress, 'fire-worshipper' is considered a wildly offensive and derogatory way to refer to Zoroastrians, and it has been used as a pejorative towards them by their oppressors in Persia and in the West alike for centuries. it is inaccurate and offensive.)
But! All that being said, I do think it would also be very fair for someone to choose to make Fedallah an Indian Zoroastrian if they wished! Both would make sense. But my Fedallah is Persian.
I am NOT myself religiously Zoroastrian (I am not at all religious), though I am Persian, and so much of the religion’s practices have still featured in my life. & I consider myself largely aligned with many of Zarathustra's/Zartosht's ideas (something I am still exploring for myself in my personal life). Any errors or missteps in portraying him respectfully are my own.
Separately from all this, I am working on writing out a story centered on Fedallah's backstory in general -- his upbringing, how he came to receive an Arabic/Muslim name, how he came to leave Persia, how he met Ahab, etc.
Regardless, Fedallah is (as I have yelled about.. SO MUCH…) deeply, deeply important to me. It is important to me that he gets treated with love and kindness and care, and the respect he deserves. He matters to me and the story I’ve made for him makes me ache. I love him so so very much.
This is by no means an exhaustive discussion of all of the complicated factors involved here; if I have glossed over some things it's because I'm trying to prevent this from being longer than it already is. This is just a VERY brief overview of some of the things that have been important to me to consider with respect to Fedallah. I love and adore him so much.
