REVISION NARRATIVE: thy unnamable imminglings // Melville probably revised “unnamable” to “nameless” on the sheets he sent to England. The change in meaning is significant. Watching the dying whale turn toward the sun, Ahab experiences a “wondrousness unknown before,” and in the soliloquy that follows, he distinguishes the dying whale’s vain sun worship at the end from the sea’s darker truth which rocks him “with a prouder, if a darker faith.” But by referring to the sea’s “imminglings” (its mixtures of life and death) as “unnamable,” Ahab admits that these mysteries cannot be named or known, and that he has no control over them. However, the revision to “nameless” alters this effect, suggesting that while the imminglings are presently nameless, they are nevertheless “namable,” hence knowable in some way. The prideful implication is that Ahab’s “darker faith” allows him a measure of control over the unknown. To compare American and British pages, click the thumbnails in the right margin.

https://melville.electroniclibrary.org/editions/versions-of-moby-dick/116-the-dying-whale