Not P but Moby-Dick (83)

[Mark Kohut]

Some writers' imaginations/writing is more engaged, more animated, becomes
fulsome even
with certain subjects that engage them over other subjects..

On Sun, Mar 10, 2024 at 4:26 AM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
wrote:

> From Chapter 104:
>
> One often hears of writers that rise and swell with their subject, though
> it may seem but an ordinary one. How, then, with me, writing of this
> Leviathan? Unconsciously my chirography expands into placard capitals. Give
> me a condor’s quill! Give me Vesuvius’ crater for an inkstand! Friends,
> hold my arms! For in the mere act of penning my thoughts of this Leviathan,
> they weary me, and make me faint with their outreaching comprehensiveness
> of sweep, as if to include the whole circle of the sciences, and all the
> generations of whales, and men, and mastodons, past, present, and to come,
> with all the revolving panoramas of empire on earth, and throughout the
> whole universe, not excluding its suburbs.
>
> What does "rise and swell" mean here?
> --
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>