Xiaolu Guo

Writer and filmmaker Xiolu Guo reimagines Moby-Dick from the perspective of a cross-dressed female sailor, in her latest work. Call Me Ishmaelle looks afresh at the epic battle between man and nature in Herman Melville’s great novel, through the eyes of a woman.

In 1843 Ishmaelle is born in a small village on the stormy Kent coast where she grows up swimming with dolphins. Later, abandoned and desperate for a life at sea, she disguises herself as a cabin boy and travels to New York, where she boards the Nimrod, a whaling ship led by the obsessive Captain Seneca.

Through the bloody male violence of whaling, and the unveiling of her feminine identity, Ishmaelle realises there is a mysterious bond between herself and the mythical white whale. Guo discusses her dramatically different, feminist narrative that stands alongside the original while offering a powerful exploration of nature, gender and human purpose.