GR as fractal world

[jporter]

>ok. everyone's sick of hearing about it, but here it is.  I wanted to
>report that as I continue reading, I still find evidence of a fractal
>universe (that is GR.)  Self-similarity on many levels creates repeating
>images throughout the text.  Yet the bifurcations keep "interrupting"
>them so that you can't get comfortable with one before another emerges.
>Right now I'm dealing with octagonal shapes, the repeating jagged edges,
>and the symbol of yin-yang.  Oh yeah, and the rainbow--actually, in colors.
>
>All this mixed with talk of "chaos theory," particularly as it was
>emerging in the mind of Mitchell Feigenbaum.  As James Gleick describes
>him, "a man seen prowling in the dark, night after night, the red glow of
>his cigarette floating along the back streets."  The smoke's pattern was
>one of Feigenbaum's areas of study in terms of order in chaos.  Well
>known.  Pynchon, in GR:  "Given the precisions of light these mornings,
>there are  forms of grace to be found in the rising of the smoke,
>meander, furl, delicate fade to clarity. . . " (206)--watching cigarette
>smoke.
>
>That's minor.  An observation last night.  More are these.  Tell me if
>you've run this down or not, ok?  I have not read anything on the
>similarity to the war film in _Slaughterhouse Five_, the one that runs
>backwards and makes the bombs go UP, back into the plane, people heal,
>etc.  There is a parallel on 203-04. (by the way, at the bottom of
>203--Viking--ther is a first person intrusion.  I am baffled.)  Anyhow,
>the film goes on, dealing with a puritan ancestor (not unlikely for TRP)
>and the whole trip over, colonizing motivations, etc--in details of the
>trip (vomitting, etc.)
>
>Another thought:  On 205, there's this whole wandering through the casino
>that, for at least 2 paragraphs, seems to echo the idea of TRP's
>narrative style (nothing new, I realize, but seems in bas relief here.)
>the "newness" of it, the anti-modernity, etc.  If you're interested,
>maybe you could read over and see if you agree, comment?
>
>One last thing, the following discussion of Plasticman--may be so obvious
>but I missed it first time--parallels Tryone's situation, part the toilet
>adventure (this, on 206-07.)
>
>Comments are appreciated, even it they tell me that my ideas are old
>news.
>
>Thanks.
>
>Bonnie.


Hey Bonnie, don't give up on that fractal thing. I know that in Vineland,
the smoke rising from the BBQ at the family renion at the end of the novel
is described as "fractal" A recognition by the Pynch of "The New Science"
I'll get you the page # tomorrow, when I'M sober. I think that the
convergence of determinism, sensitive dependence on initial events, and
unpredictability are all manifest in pynchon's works...if there is a
"strange attractor" affecting his guidance system, I'm still
looking...Maybe the Koopster can provide some clues.

Morning becomes Electra,

jp