dates

[Brian D. McCary]

John Mascaro asked:

"I have been pondering this TV/VL thing for a while, frustrated specifically 
by those parenthetical dates for every show mentioned.  Something feels out 
of whack w/ them.  Even the parentheses seem loaded somehow, but I can't 
figure out what disturbs me about them.  Are they like Slothrop's stars in 
some weird way? "

The story I heard (perhaps on this list) was that some critic accused 
TRP of referring to a movie which hadn't been made yet, somewhere in 
GR, and that the dates in VL were included as either an act of contrition
to a valid criticism, or one book long extended finger to an invalid one.
'Course, I've got nothing to back this story up, nor does it preclude the
possibility of him encoding something in the dates, but after reading those
Wanda letters, the dates sure start looking like some kind of in-joke.

Brian McCary