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“In life, the visible surface of the Sperm Whale is not the least among the many marvels he presents. Almost invariably it is all over obliquely crossed and re-crossed with numberless straight marks in thick array, something like those in the finest Italian line engravings. But these marks do not seem to be impressed upon the isinglass substance above mentioned, but seem to be seen through it, as if they were engraved upon the body itself. Nor is this all. In some instances, to the quick, observant eye, those linear marks, as in a veritable engraving, but afford the ground for far other delineations. These are hieroglyphical; that is, if you call those mysterious cyphers on the walls of pyramids hieroglyphics, then that is the proper word to use in the present connexion. By my retentive memory of the hieroglyphics upon one Sperm Whale in particular, I was much struck with a plate representing the old Indian characters chiselled on the famous hieroglyphic palisades on the banks of the Upper Mississippi. Like those mystic rocks, too, the mystic-marked whale remains undecipherable.”
― Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or, The Whale

“Nate had been born and raised in British Columbia, and Canadians hate, above all things, to offend. It was part of the national consciousness. "Be polite" was an unwritten, unspoken rule, but ingrained into the psyche of an entire country. (Of course, as with any rule, there were exceptions: parts of Quebec, where people maintained the "dismissive to the point of confrontation, with subsequent surrender" mind-set of the French; and hockey, in which any Canadian may, with impunity, slam, pummel, elbow, smack, punch, body-check, and beat the shit out of, with sticks, any other human being, punctuated by profanities, name-calling, questioning parentage, and accusations of bestiality, usually-coincidentally- in French.)”
― Christopher Moore, Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

“I couldn't help wondering where porpoises had learned this game of running on the bows of ships. Porpoises have been swimming in the oceans for seven to ten million years, but they've had human ships to play with for only the last few thousand. Yet nearly all porpoises, in every ocean, catch rides for fun from passing ships; and they were doing it on the bows of Greek triremes and prehistoric Tahitian canoes, as soon as those seacraft appeared. What did they do for fun before ships were invented?
Ken Norris made a field observation one day that suggests the answer. He saw a humpback whale hurrying along the coast of the island of Hawaii, unavoidably making a wave in front of itself; playing in that bow wave was a flock of bottlenose porpoises. The whale didn't seem to be enjoying it much: Ken said it looked like a horse being bothered by flies around its head; however, there was nothing much the whale could do about it, and the porpoises were having a fun time. ”
― Karen Pryor, Lads Before the Wind: Diary of a Dolphin Trainer

“No theory ever benefited by the application of data, Amy. Data kills theories. A theory has no better time than when it's lying there naked, pure, unsullied by facts. Let's just keep it that way for a while."

"So you don't really have a theory?"

"Clueless."

"You lying bag of fish heads."

"I can fire you, you know. Even if Clay was the one that hired you, I'm not totally superfluous to this operation yet. I'm kind of in charge. I can fire you. Then how will you live?"

"I'm not getting paid."

"See, right there. Perfectly good concept ruined by the application of fact.”
― Christopher Moore, Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

“The heroic and often tragic stories of American whalemen were renowned. They sailed the world鈥檚 oceans and brought back tales filled with bravery, perseverance, endurance, and survival. They mutinied, murdered, rioted, deserted, drank, sang, spun yarns, scrimshawed, and recorded their musings and observations in journals and letters. They survived boredom, backbreaking work, tempestuous seas, floggings, pirates, putrid food, and unimaginable cold. Enemies preyed on them in times of war, and competitors envied them in times of peace. Many whalemen died from violent encounters with whales and from terrible miscalculations about the unforgiving nature of nature itself. And through it all, whalemen, those 鈥渋ron men in wooden boats鈥� created a legacy of dramatic, poignant, and at times horrific stories that can still stir our emotions and animate the most primal part of our imaginations. 鈥淭o produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme,鈥� proclaimed Herman Melville, and the epic story of whaling is one of the mightiest themes in American history.”
― Eric Jay Dolin, Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America

“Whales are silly once every two years. The young are called short-heads or baby blimps. Many whale romances begin in Baffin's bay and end in Procter and Gamble's factory, Staten Island.”
― Will Cuppy, How to Tell Your Friends from the Apes

“American whale oil lit the world. It was used in the production of soap, textiles, leather, paints, and varnishes, and it lubricated the tools and machines that drove the Industrial Revolution. The baleen cut from the mouths of whales shaped the course of feminine fashion by putting the hoop in hooped skirts and giving form to stomachtightening
and chest-crushing corsets. Spermaceti, the waxy substance from the heads of sperm whales, produced the brightest- and cleanest-burning candles the world has ever known, while ambergris, a byproduct of irritation in a sperm whale鈥檚 bowel, gave perfumes great staying power and was worth its weight in gold.”
― Eric Jay Dolin, Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America

“In the November 2006 issue of Science, a report by an international team of scientists studying a vast amount of data gathered between 1950 and 2003 declared that if current trends of fishing and pollution continue, every fishery in the world's oceans will collapse by 2048...The oceans as an ecosystem would completely collapse.”
― Peter Heller, The Whale Warriors: The Battle at the Bottom of the World to Save the Planet's Largest Mammals

“From the slope of Haleakala, the Old Broad watched the activity in the channel with a two-hundred-power celestial telescope and a pair of "big eyes" binoculars that looked like stereo bazookas on precision mounts that were anchored into a ton of concrete.”
― Christopher Moore, Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

“What are you working on?" Elizabeth asked. Nate could hear her tapping a pencil on her desk. She took notes during their conversations. He didn't know what she did with the notes, but it bothered him.
"I have a lecture at the sanctuary in four days." Why, why had he told her? Why? Now she'd rattle down the mountain in her ancient Mercedes that looked like a Nazi staff car, sit in the audience, and ask all the questions that she knew in advance he couldn't answer.”
― Christopher Moore, Fluke: Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings

“A striking pattern emerged on days with the most intense solar storms, grey whales were 4 times more likely to beach themselves. This correlation doesn't prove that whales have a compass but it strongly hints that they do. More than that, it speaks to the awesome nature of magnetoreception. Here is a sense in which the forces produced by a planetary layer of molten metal collide with those unleashed by a tempestuous star, together swaying the mind of a wandering animal and determining whether it finds its way successfully or loses it for good.”
― Ed Yong, An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us

“It was a sight full of quick wonder and awe! The vast swells of the omnipotent sea; the surging, hollow roar they made, as they rolled along the eight gunwales, like gigantic bowls in a boundless bowling-green; the brief suspended agony of the boat, as it would tip for an instant on the knife-like edge of the sharper waves, that almost seemed threatening to cut it in two; the sudden profound dip into the watery glens and hollows; the keen spurring and goadings to gain the top of the opposite hill; the headlong, sled-like slide down its other side;--all these, with the cries of the headsmen and harpooners, and the shuddering gasps of the oarsmen, with the wondrous sight of the ivory Pequod bearing down upon her boats with outstretched sails, like a wild hen after her screaming brood;--all this was thrilling. Not the raw recruit, marching from the bosom of his wife into the fever heat of his first battle; not the dead man's ghost encountering the first unknown phantom in the other world;--neither of these can feel stranger and stronger emotions than that man does, who for the first time finds himself pulling into the charmed, churned circle of the hunted sperm whale.”
― Herman Melville, Moby Dick

“The orca鈥檚 big brain was bigger than he had hoped鈥攆ive times the size of a human鈥檚 and weighing in at nearly fifteen pounds. And this was from a young whale, not a mature adult. The brain was also more complicated than McGeer had imagined鈥攎ore complicated than a human brain. Dolphin brains were impressive, but this brain was spectacular.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“In an age when whales were judged by how easy it was to render them into oil, or grind them into pet food and fertilizer, killer whales were a problem even if they weren鈥檛 killing humans.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“People had considered this the most fearsome creature on the planet. The most vicious. The most predatory. Without any rivals. It could beat anything in the ocean, so, therefore, it qualified as the most feared of all beasts. Totally wrong. So I guess Moby Doll changed the world鈥檚 attitudes towards killer whales. Instead of seeing a killer鈥攁 savage monster like Moby Dick鈥攖he world met a cuddly companion, Moby Doll.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“For a long time, humans have wondered about the possibility of intelligent life on other planets while ignoring the intelligent life on this one. Orcas have a language and a culture that predates ours, so how do we justify imprisoning them or, more importantly, destroying their habitat?”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“Every bar that鈥檚 set to prove human superiority to orcas seems to be as easy for the whales to jump as the hurdles set out for them at SeaWorld. Orcas fit every definition for humanity humans have come up with that doesn鈥檛 require opposable thumbs.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“In 1964, no one was watching whales for fun. Today, every orca in the Salish Sea is a star.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, The Killer Whale Who Changed the World

“The only intelligence tests orcas don't pass are the ones that require hands.”
― Mark Leiren-Young, Orcas Everywhere: The Mystery and History of Killer Whales

“Bouton-de-Rose, ahoy! are there any of you Bouton-de-Roses that speak English?”
― Herman Melville, Moby Dick

“Whales should have solar panels on their backs. That would make them more fuel efficient, and it would also stop them from crying outside my window every night.”
― Jarod Kintz, A Memoir of Memories and Memes

“Installing solar panels on a whale鈥檚 back would solve two problems at once. The second problem it would solve would be identifying the first problem it would solve.”
― Jarod Kintz, Me and memes and memories

“The oceans, it turns out, are full of bone-eating worms”
― Helen Scales, The Brilliant Abyss

“Sea World orcas work as many as eight shows a day, 365 days a year. In the ocean, these whales can swim up to ninety miles a day. In captivity, the tanks are measured in feet. In the ocean, orcas have highly evolved and cohesive matriarchal cultures. Generations of family members, combining both females and males, spend their entire lives together鈥攚ith each family, or pod, communicating its own unique dialect. In captivity, little to none of this exists. Orca culture is effectively destroyed.”
― Jason Hribal, Fear of the Animal Planet: The Hidden History of Animal Resistance

“She was not spouting, but sewing the water with her body,”
― Sena Jeter Naslund, Ahab's Wife, or The Star-Gazer

“Only the continued attention of a concerned public, plus genuine scientific research into the biology and natural history of these remarkable animals, will ensure that our children and grandchildren will be able to see for themselves the largest animals to have ever lived on earth. Stay informed, eat seafood responsibly, speak out, and support genuine marine biological research. If you enjoy the offshore environment, then act to protect it. Today we are the stewards of our environment, and if we lose these precious ocean resources through our ignorance, greed, or indifference, we will have caused an immeasurable loss to future generations of humanity.”
― Noble S. Proctor, A Field Guide to North Atlantic Wildlife: Marine Mammals, Seabirds, Fish, and Other Sea Life

“Deep Blue Mystic - A Haiku

Mighty ocean's grace,
True power lies in stillness,
Destruction withheld.”
― Amogh Swamy, On My Way To Infinity: A Seeker's Poetic Pilgrimage

“To be fair, my whale song did sound a bit like one was mating with a bagpipe.”
― Becky Dean, Picture Perfect Boyfriend

“All this plastic is getting in the way of our animal duty. Which is, we've got to eat each other over and over to keep this carousel turning round.”
― Daniel Kraus, Whalefall

“This isle of Albion never ceased to amaze him. At night, Jesus would lay awake watching the stars before the gentle lull of the lapping waves sent him to sleep. But naturally, he was not so foolish as to camp where he could be washed out to sea by the tides and always made sure there was a safe way to scale the cliffs if the need arose. Once, he had been startled into wakefulness by an unfamiliar sound but soon realised it was the eerie calling of passing whales communicating with each other as they sang of their joy for life. And as their song resonated deep within his soul, Jesus felt the greatness and generosity of their spirit. Their relevance and connection to the mysteries of the universe.”
― Natasha Rendell, Imagining Jesus