Top 10 seafaring tales

Carsten Jensen, renowned Danish author and worldwide cultural critic, has just published his epic novel We, The Drowned, in English. He was awarded the Golden Laurels for I Have Seen the World Begin; the Danske Banks Litteraturpris, Denmark's most prestigious literary award; and, most recently, the Palme prize.

He named his top ten seafaring tales for the Guardian.

One title on the list:

Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

Melville's masterpiece tells the tale of Captain Ahab and his obsessive quest for a whale whose terrifying whiteness comes to embody evil itself. I doubt that any contemporary publisher would take on such a vast, eccentric, anarchic work if it crossed their desk today. Reading it, you realise what a free and wide-ranging genre the novel once was, and how much has been wrecked by a book industry catering to the most conventional taste. Not only does Melville forget all about his main character, Ishmael, for hundreds of pages, but he also allows himself to indulge in endless speculations about the nature of whales, before reaching the conclusion that they're not mammals, but fish. What to do in the presence of such artistic nerve, but salute?

Read about the other entries on Jensen's list.

Moby-Dick also appears among John Mullan's list of ten of the best tattoos in literature, Susan Cheever's five best books about obsession, Christopher Buckley's best books, Jane Yolen's five most important books, Chris Dodd's best books, Augusten Burroughs' five most important books, Norman Mailer's top ten works of literature, David Wroblewski's five most important books, Russell Banks' five most important books, and Philip Hoare's top ten books about whales.

--Marshal Zeringue