GR

[Paul Mackin]

On Tue, 27 Feb 1996 Ronkarate at aol.com wrote:

> BUT, one passage in the opening has not only been my key to understanding GR,
> but something which I've taken as a manifesto for life:
> 
> "No, this is not a disentanglement from, but a progressive _knotting into_"
> 
> I believe that sentence not only sets the tone for the novel, but for my
> everyday living as well.

I too have always been impressed by this very weighty sounding sentence,
but never quite saw what exactly it referred to (beyond the obvious 
literal meaning in the opening scene of the book).

Is it possible Wallace's Infinite Jest holds a clue?
(Or, am I full of it this evening?)

On p. 900, we find the following:

". . . We are all dying to give our lives away to something, maybe.
God or Satan, politics or grammar, topology or philately -- the
object seemed incidental to this will to give oneself away, utterly. 
To games or needles, to some other person. Something pathetic about
it. A FLIGHT-FROM IN THE FORM OF A PLUNGING-INTO . . . "
(emphasis added)

Isn't there a marked similarity between the emphasized phrase 
and the statement from _GR_?  Both in meaning and form? Right down
to the verbal/preposition combos?

Keep in mind that a main theme in _IJ_ is addiction--to drugs
and to achieving sports excellence. These are what one is "plunging-
into".

But aren't many of the characters in _GR_ equally addicted in a way
to _their_ various learned and power-grabbing pursuits? And aren't
these what _they_ are "knotting into"?

Just a thought.

				P.