white whale

noun

1

: beluga sense 2

2

or less commonly great white whale : something (such as a goal or object) that is obsessively pursued

It was the old man's white whale, the holy grail shining at the end of the dream, on and off the rails, as he chased scripts, directors, and movie stars of the proper magnitude.

—Rich Cohen

For drug makers, developing the first Alzheimer's therapy has long been seen as the great white whale: the toughest challenge and biggest opportunity.

—Robert Weisman

Illustration of white whale

• white whale 1

Examples of white whale in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

This was Costner’s white whale, a $200 million Western that made Dances With Wolves look like a Sundance indie. —Peter Kiefer, HollywoodReporter, 8 Oct. 2025

By getting one of the world’s most powerful drug companies to finally agree to his demands, Trump has caught a white whale. —Nicholas Florko, The Atlantic, 2 Oct. 2025

The film has remained in the vault for years since, becoming somewhat of a white whale for the director’s fans. —J. Kim Murphy, Variety, 1 Oct. 2025

Removing the sales tax from fuel sales has been the elusive white whale in decades of road funding discussions. —Paul Egan, Freep.com, 26 Sep. 2025

Word History

Etymology

(sense 2) after the white sperm whale obsessively hunted by Captain Ahab in Herman Melville's novel Moby Dick (1851)

First Known Use

1635, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for white whale

• abigail
• cottontail
• countervail
• fingernail
• martingale
• mesoscale
• microscale
• monorail
• nanoscale
• ponytail
• swallowtail
• wensleydale