This is part of a series of posts representing ideas from the book, Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn. I view the ideas explored in Ishmael to be so important to the world that it seems everyone should have a chance to be exposed. I hope this treatment inspires you to read the original.

This post covers Chapter ONE, which introduces the protagonist/narrator (who we learn in later books to be named Alan Lomax) and the telepathic gorilla named Ishmael who is to be Alan’s teacher. The chapter is presented in eight numbered subsections, beginning on page 1 of both the original printing and the 25th anniversary printing. The sections below mirror this arrangement in the book. See the launch post for notes on conventions I have adopted for this series.

1: Angry Alan

Alan sees an ad in the paper by a teacher seeking a pupil having “an earnest desire to save the world.” Alan throws the paper in the garbage in disgust. What BS, he thinks. He imagines a charlatan posing as a wise sage, and gullible people queuing up to part with their money and lap up the drivel.

Alan is reminded of his own youthful, naive fantasies from the “children’s revolt” of the 1960s aiming to realize a better world. He’d always wanted a personal sage that never materialized, so this ad hit a little close to home. As a teenager, Alan expected to wake up each morning to find a new world-order of love and peace. Songs of the time reinforced this juvenile vision.

At one point, he snapped out of it, and found that others had done so as well—seemingly to the point of denying it had ever been a thing. Jobs, bills, mortgages, shopping: these constitute the real world. But he had a hard time letting go of the desire for a wise instructor somewhere out there—despite the more grounded sense that no one knows anything not already available in libraries. After setting aside these fantasies, it was as if some part of him died, leaving scar tissue.

This is why the ad was so triggering for Alan. It was as if a love interest who had repeatedly spurned him placed an ad looking for someone who might offer love.

Deciding his response to the ad to be irrational, he let it go. Or did he?

2: Alan Meets the Teacher

Alan was compelled to go check out the situation, to satisfy his curiosity about just what sort of nonsense this was—something at which to sneer and then put out of his head. He was surprised to find an unassuming—even shabby—building downtown serving as office space for various lower-rung professionals.

Room 105 was a large, nearly vacant space containing only a small bookcase of a few dozen books and a large cushy chair facing the wall to the right: a throne in which he imagined the sage would sit—supplicants making do on the floor. But what hit him in the face was the odor: like that of a zoo!

The room decidedly lacked a swarm of gullible students, or even a teacher, for that matter. Odd.

It was at this point that Alan noticed the large, dark, interior window on the wall to the right. He assumed some sacred and inspirational relic sat behind the glass, beyond the reach of unwashed hands. As he approached the dark glass, his reflection dominated. Shifting focus beyond the glass, his eyes met another pair, staring back at him. He nearly toppled back into the chair!

In that split second, he registered that what he beheld was a massive gorilla. Though the gorilla’s pose was peaceful, the sight was frightening. His gaze was transfixed onto that face of terrible beauty.

As the fright subsided, Alan reasoned that the teacher was absent, and he may as well leave. But surely he should at least get something out of the experience, having driven into town. So, he looked in vain for materials with which to leave a note. In so-doing, he noticed a poster on the wall in the dark room behind the gorilla that said:

WITH MAN GONE,
WILL THERE
BE HOPE
FOR GORILLA?

He tripped over the ambiguity in the words. Was it man’s presence or extinction that would favor the gorilla? It perturbed Alan that this gorilla was held captive simply as a gimmicky prop, just to emphasize this ill-defined set of words.

He told himself that he should react in some way to his irritation, going further to suggest that he settle into the seat. This self-direction out of nowhere felt a little odd to Alan, and he questioned whether it would indeed be best to sit down. The immediate answer was that if he sat still, he could listen. Looking back into the eyes of the gorilla, it became obvious that it was the gorilla speaking to him through his own thoughts! He stumbled into the chair, confounded.

Alan wondered how this could possibly be, to which an answer availed: it just is; ’nuff said. It was at this moment it dawned on Alan that this hulking beast was the teacher!

The gorilla seemed to ignore Alan’s asking for his name, but checked whether Alan wished to hear the tale of how he came to be here.

His story began in the wilds of Africa, describing the common practice of men shooting all the females in a gorilla group, grabbing the young, and selling them to the highest bidder. Alan expressed his horror, but the gorilla seemed indifferent, having been too young for it to have lodged in memory. Anyway, he ended up in a zoo in the northeastern U.S., where he spent a few years growing into an adolescent.

3: Goliath’s Story

Life in the zoo is stilted, and all the animals know this. When you see repetitive behaviors (like pacing), the inner monologue is something like “Why, why, why, why?” This question sears the animal’s brain continuously, even if unclear about what exactly is amiss. They just know in their bones: it’s far from right. The gorilla reported vague memories of a more dynamic and enjoyable time and place, compared with the insane tedium of life in a zoo. Why is it that life is split into these two night-and-day modes?

He wasn’t aware of his state of captivity: of being prevented from life in the wild. The main missing ingredient, he decided, was family—of being like a finger in a hand. Yes, there were other “severed fingers” (gorillas) with him at the zoo, but loose digits don’t comprise a functioning hand.

In the wild, a variety of delicious food is everywhere—like air and water—to the point of being taken for granted. The zoo, by comparison, delivered meager, bland offerings on a rigid schedule.

The Great Depression resulted in zoos downsizing or closing outright, which ushered in a new phase of living in a traveling menagerie. Not all cages are the same. It became more clear in the menagerie that the humans were coming explicitly to see the animals, which had been less obvious at the zoo. Being the only gorilla, visitors spoke directly to him, which was, for some reason, suppressed at the zoo when multiple gorillas shared a cage.

He noticed a recurring pattern in the speech of those trying to get his attention. He was at a loss for its meaning, until he noticed a different pattern in the repetitive sounds uttered at the adjacent cage containing a chimp with her baby. That one was Zsa-Zsa. He was Goliath.

This was quite the revelation: to be a unique individual! It was as if being born anew. From there, language comprehension was not impossible to acquire—especially in the presence of adults employing techniques deliberately aimed at teaching their children language. Within a few years, he could follow most conversations.

A persistent mystery, however, was the use of the term “animals” to refer to those in the cages. Weren’t the humans also animals? They clearly did not think of themselves this way, but the difference was elusive to Goliath. He also learned from visitor conversations that he was caged because he was “wild” and dangerous. Life was at least more interesting than in the zoo, and he did not begrudge his keepers—who seemed just as bound to the menagerie as himself. He had no notion of being deprived of a “right” to freedom. This was just the way life was.

One rainy day when visitors were scarce, a mysterious man turned up, heading straight for Goliath. After staring into each others’ eyes for a few minutes in dripping silence, the man pronounced “You are not Goliath,” upon which he made a deliberate exit.

4: No Longer Goliath

He who had been known as Goliath was “thunderstruck” by being stripped of a name: now he was nobody! The returning crowds continued to call him Goliath, but it no longer rang true.

After a few days, he awoke from a drugged torpor in a secured gazebo on an estate lawn near a large house. Maybe the menagerie people had learned of his deceit—not actually being Goliath—and had banished him. While the new venue was lovely and spacious, the threat of extreme boredom loomed: even worse than the zoo.

Around mid-day, he noticed a man standing nearby, and came to recognize him as the one who had stripped him of his identity. In a déjà-vu repetition, they exchanged a long stare, after which the man confirmed that he was correct in expunging his former name, but now confidently named him Ishmael, then walked away as he had before.

Ishmael was flooded with a renewed sense of being: back from the void, but this time with the corrected name. All was right in the world.

The affair was quite mysterious. Who was this god-like man, able to twice utterly rock his world in a few words? How had he discovered his new location? Ishmael assumed that having settled the matter of his proper name, he would never see the man again—job completed.

Walter Sokolow was a wealthy businessman who had just learned of his family’s perishing in the Nazi holocaust. In his bereaved wanderings, he came across the menagerie and the advertising poster for a terrifyingly monstrous Goliath. Having other monsters of the world on his mind, he had to see this embodiment of monstrosity behind bars—to savor the justice. He found, instead, a sensitive being far from the doorstep of evil. His rescue of Ishmael was a pale repentance for failing to rescue his lost family.

Mr. Sokolow had also hired away the handler from the menagerie, and learned how to tend to Ishmael. Asked if Ishmael was dangerous, the handler said: only due to sheer size and power, but not by demeanor.

Spending time outside the gazebo/cage, Mr. Sokolow started relating his story—as if to the ether. At one point, Ishmael offered a sympathetic gesture of touch through the bars. This startled Mr. Sokolow, but also hinted at some modicum of real understanding. A few quick tests demonstrated unambiguous language comprehension.

This amazing discovery led to a prolonged series of excruciating failures in which Mr. Sokolow tried to train Ishmael to vocalize—despite incompatible hardware. Ishmael’s frustration finally erupted in a telepathic outburst. The floodgates were open, and the two began a decade-long program of education and joint study, with Mr. Sokolow eventually becoming something of a research assistant to fuel Ishmael’s voracious curiosity.

Ishmael had long since moved into the house. His independence and capacity for self-care allowed Mr. Sokolow to return to a social life, leading to a society lady “landing” this eligible bachelor. They married, and Ishmael—whose capabilities were withheld from the wife—returned to live in the gazebo. The new wife had no love for this odd “pet,” constantly advocating his removal. Mr. Sokolow firmly refused. They soon had a daughter, named Rachel.

5: Dear Rachel

Rachel grew up spending a substantial amount of time with Ishmael and her father. To her mother’s great chagrin, a tight bond developed between Rachel and Ishmael that did not dissipate once she began school. Ishmael really helped raise Rachel, obviously sharing a telepathic connection from the start.

Rachel excelled in school, having such marvelous support from Ishmael, skipping grades and earning a master’s in biology before age twenty. Sadly, Mr. Sokolow died in 1985, naming Rachel as Ishmael’s protector. Bye bye, gazebo.

After casting about for a few years in a new location prepared for him, Ishmael finds his calling as teacher. He establishes a means of living in the city, bringing the story to the present.

6: Ishmael the Socratic Teacher

Ishmael mentions four past pupils, labeling all as failed outcomes. He attributes this to both the extremely challenging nature of the subject, and to not understanding his pupils well enough.

Asked by Alan what the subject matter is, Ishmael—in a style that pervades the book—asks Alan in a Socratic style to guess. Alan is not particularly good at this game (throughout most of the book), so that Ishmael ultimately reveals that he has particular insight into the subject of captivity.

How is captivity relevant to saving the world? Well, who in our culture wants to destroy the world? No one? Yet they are: everyone contributing to its destruction. Then why don’t you stop? It’s because you’re trapped in a destructive system.

Ishmael characterizes the young people’s efforts in the sixties as trying to escape from captivity, but failing to do so “because they were unable to find the bars of the cage.” People of our culture would be relieved to escape captivity, and to simultaneously release Earth from its dire path toward collapse—except we can’t identify the bars.

Alan asks what to do next, and Ishmael recommends complementing the story of how he came to be here with Alan’s account of what brought him to this time and place.

7: Alan the Lackluster Student

Alan describes an assignment in a college philosophy class connected to epistemology: how we come to know what we do. For this paper, Alan constructed a counterfactual story of the far future after a complete Nazi victory. The Aryan race had replaced all other people around the globe. Education was Aryan through and through: art, history, language, religion, politics, technology. Before long, no one needed to censor textbook content, because all anyone knew to write was already purified.

But one day in Tokyo, two students, Kurt and Hans, were in discussion. Kurt indicated a sneaking feeling that they had all been lied to, somehow—but was unable to put his finger on it. That’s how the paper ended. Alan’s teacher asked if he himself felt we’d been lied to. Alan affirmed that he did, but like Kurt could not articulate anything more.

Ismael asked if Alan still felt that way. Yes, but not as fervently. Why not? Because it doesn’t matter. It wouldn’t make a difference to our daily routine. Ah: but if you all learned of the lie you’ve been told, you would change. There’s our goal. More tomorrow.

8: Was It All a Dream?

Alan was unsettled by the events of the day. Maybe it was all a dream. Being a loner without real friends, he had no one to talk to about it.

The next morning, the dream explanation seemed most likely. But he made his way downtown to find the same building, Room 105, and a thick odor in the room. After a moment’s silent assessment as if determining whether Alan had the metal to proceed, Ishmael launched without preamble.

Next Time

In the next installment, Chapter 2, we begin to travel Ishmael’s ambitious lesson plan. So, buckle up!

I thank Alex Leff for looking over a draft of this post and offering valuable comments and suggestions.

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