First hang around the ocean, not a nice beach part, but a rocky coastline with a nearby fishing village, abandoned or functioning, or strike up a conversation with an obsessive sailboat sailor, or something along those lines, before reading Melville.
Lordy, Siham, I don't have time for literary foreplay.
I'm not restricting this to classics. The idea is that we might encourage one another to read parts of what is unread.
Have at it.