Safe Sex is No Fun

[Paul Mackin]

On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Dennis Jones wrote:

> Pudding's  turd chewing sessions  can 
> be seen as desperate, and ultimately fatal attempts to re-enter a kind of 
> lost paradise of shared nightmare - a rather extreme manifestation of a 
> yearning expressed by many WW1 survivors who mourned the loss of a unique 
> intimacy that was born and left behind in the mud, shit and putrefaction of 
> the front. The smell and taste of shit is Pudding's madaleine, his memory 
> trigger. Perhaps it's not just Lady Death being worshipped here but a kind 
> of love too. >


For further insight into where Pudding is coming from, read Pat Barker's
three novels set against the smell and taste of WW I. She can match
Pynchon punch for punch in the sex and shit department.

					P.