Ishmael

A philosophical novel written by Daniel Quinn, the book first begins with our narrator finding an ad in the paper that reads:

TEACHER SEEKS PUPIL.
Must have an earnest desire to save the world.
Apply in person.

Jaded by the lack of change that occured during the 60s, the narrator then answers to this ad to confront this so-called teacher, and ends up learning about just how the world works.

This novel is the first in a trilogy that includes My Ishmael and The Story of B.

Tropes used in Ishmael include:

• Bittersweet Ending: The narrator is Ishmael's first successful student and learns all that he needs to know, but Ishmael dies.
  • In the sequel, we find out that he actually faked his death so his student would quit following him around and go apply what he'd been taught.
• Cain and Abel: Takers and Leavers, basically. Specifically, Ishmael theorizes the social conditions (competition between takers and leavers) under which the framework of the story of Cain and Abel arose.
• Call a Rabbit a Smeerp: Takers and Leavers, for, roughly, hunter-gatherers and agriculturalists. The difference is more complex than that, which is why he invents the new terminology.
• Catch Your Death of Cold: Ishmael seems to do just that.
• Didn't See That Coming: Bet you weren't expecting to find that Ishmael is actually a telepathic gorilla.
• Faking the Dead: As shown in the sequel My Ishmael, he didn't actually die.
• The End of the World as We Know It: The ultimate consequense of Taker cultures ruling the earth.
• Everything's Better with Monkeys
• The Film of the Book: Sort of. Instinct, a film starring Anthony Hopkins and Cuba Gooding, Jr., recasts the gorilla as an old man in jail for murder. It turns out he was an anthropologist working with gorillas a la Jane Goodall. He's in jail because he murdered two poachers who shot the apes he'd come to love.
• First-Person Peripheral Narrator: The nameless narrator tells the story of Ishmael.
• God Is Flawed: The Taker reasoning, according to the narrator, is that the gods made man to rule the world, but the gods were incompetent and made man flawed. Therefore, man has to take his destiny into his own hands.
• It Makes Sense in Context: Actually, even after you find out what the teacher really is, it still doesn't really make sense. You just roll with it.
• Koan:

WITH MAN GONE
WILL THERE
BE HOPE
FOR GORILLA?

The rejoinder:

WITH GORILLA GONE
WILL THERE
BE HOPE
FOR MAN?

• Names to Run Away From Really Fast: Before Ishmael was called Ishmael, his name was Goliath.
• The Noble Savage: mentioned and refuted by Ishmael.
• Screw Destiny: What Takers evidently say to the gods and the rest of the world. It doesn't turn out well, since it makes 'em arrogant, and they/we start growing proud.
• Shout-Out: Quite a lot of references including but not limited to: Stonehenge, the Piped Piper, the Rosetta Stone, the second murderer in Macbeth...
• Stern Teacher: Ishmael.