All 4 Uses of
inflexible
in
Moby Dick
- Yet was this Nantucketer a man with some good-hearted traits; and this Lakeman, a mariner, who though a sort of devil indeed, might yet by inflexible firmness, only tempered by that common decency of human recognition which is the meanest slave's right; thus treated, this Steelkilt had long been retained harmless and docile.
Chpt 52-54inflexible = not bendable or adaptable
- Such, gentlemen, is the inflexibility of sea-usages and the instinctive love of neatness in seamen; some of whom would not willingly drown without first washing their faces.†
Chpt 52-54 *
- And when after gaining his own deck, and his own pivot-hole there, he so vehemently wheeled round with an urgent command to the steersman (it was, as ever, something about his not steering inflexibly enough);
Chpt 106-108inflexibly = in a manner that is not bendable or adaptable
- But as ever before, the pagan harpooneers remained almost wholly unimpressed; or if impressed, it was only with a certain magnetism shot into their congenial hearts from inflexible Ahab's.
Chpt 124-126inflexible = not bendable or adaptable
Definition:
not bendable or adaptable
in various senses, including:
- not willing to compromise or make concessions -- as when a boss says "Do it my way or you're fired."
- not able to adjust well to different conditions -- as of a schedule that cannot be changed
- not easily bent without physical damage or injury -- as of brittle steel or person with stiff joints