white whale

Figurative and additional senses derive from references to Herman Melville's 1851 novel Moby-Dick, in which Captain Ahab relentlessly pursues an albino sperm whale.

white whale (plural white whales)

1. A cetacean, Delphinapterus leucas, found in the Arctic Ocean.
   • 2007, Nancy Lord, “Prologue”, in Beluga Days: Tracking the Endangered White Whale, pages 22–23:

     The English called the beluga the "white whale", a name often still used (and not to be confused with the white whale of Moby-Dick, which was an albino sperm whale).

2. (figuratively) An obsession; monomania.
   • 2008, Glen Inglis, Broken Heroes, page 228:

     "No. . . no sapphires. It looks like Lester Velasquez was chasing his white whale. There never were any sapphires inside that diner."

   • 2016 August 2, Mike Isaac, “Instagram Takes a Page From Snapchat, and Takes Aim at It, Too”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     For nearly four years, Snapchat has been Facebook’s white whale.

   • 2021 December 13, Molly Ball; Jeffrey Kluger; Alejandro de la Garza, “Elon Musk: Person of the Year 2021”, in Time Magazine‎:

     After being lofted into space by a Falcon Super Heavy, his next rocket, the Starship, will light out for the moon, land there, take off and return to Earth, with no stages expended on the lunar journey. This so-called single-stage-to-orbit model has been the white whale of rocket designers for generations.

3. (trading cards) A printing plate used to manufacture a particular sports card, that is then issued as a collectible itself.

• (whale): beluga, beluga whale, sea canary

• Beluga whale on Wikipedia.Wikipedia