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<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008>Kai sez: </SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>>
</FONT></SPAN>It's also the whole project <SPAN
class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3> [WvB] </FONT></SPAN>stands for. All that<BR><SPAN
class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3><FONT face=Tahoma
size=2>></FONT> </FONT></SPAN>Leary-like grandiosity madness about
colonies in space and such.<SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3> ..</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><FONT size=3><SPAN class=937490314-02012008>One mighht
note that Leary had wigged himself out long before latching onto
space </SPAN>.<SPAN class=937490314-02012008> .. but any stick will
do to beat a bad dog, eh? </SPAN></FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><FONT size=3><SPAN
class=937490314-02012008></SPAN></FONT></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3>></FONT></SPAN>Who is providing the rainbow? The earth and its
elementary powers.<SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3> </FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>Live and learn;
silly me, all these years I'd been under the impression that
</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>(1) the (emblematic,
Judeo-Christian) rainbow was a promise from YHWH, Mr. Sky God and Written
Lawgiver par excellence, pretty much the opposite of the chthonic and
intuitive powers that the creators of the Old Testament rejected and
condemned</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008></SPAN><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT
face=Arial size=3>(2) the (scientific, analytic) rainbow is produced
by sunlight and airborne water droplets, not as far as I know by the
fecund mud of Bad Karma</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>To
me, Gravity's Rainbow is about the *perversion* of transcendent
impulses (Rilke's gone wrong in the "apolitical" wandervogel youth every
bit as much as Oberth's gone wrong at Peenemunde). That's much richer and
more interesting to me than root-and-branch condemnation of the
impulse itself. . </FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial
size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>By the same token, I
think there's more to be learned from the von Braun who enthralled Rotary
Club luncheons in New Mexico and Alabama, who fit so perfectly into the
quintessentially American medium of Walt Disney TV, than from righteous
indignation at the War Criminal Among Us.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3></FONT></SPAN><SPAN
class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3></FONT></SPAN> </DIV>
<DIV><SPAN class=937490314-02012008><FONT face=Arial size=3>I find it hard to
believe that Pynchon has absorbed and pondered all that science
and technology simply to proclaim that it's eeeevil, and we've got to get
ourselves back to the garden. I think he is so eloquent and provocative
about the von Braun "project" in GR (like the Enlightenment "project" in
M&D, the modernist "project" in AtD, etc.) precisely because he
feels and acknowledges their promise as much as he mistrusts it. Why
anyone would want to shoehorn that into a neat little framework
of Them (mad scientists) vs. Us (good humanists) escapes
me. </FONT></SPAN></DIV></BODY></HTML>