Maas o menos: Infinity

[davemarc]

At 12:01 AM 11/6/96 +0000, Eric wrote:
>Dear Friends---
>
>Diana York Blaine wrote:
>> 
>> May I point out the suitably Pynchonian (not to mention Foucauldian)
>> difficulty y'all are having in finding out the "true" origin of
>> Maas?  Even the carbon-unit bearing that name in Real Landia cannot (it's
>> ok Steve, we feel your pain.)  Reminds me alot of Oedipa's search for the
>> source of the Courier's Tragedy in CoL49 itself. Strike another blow
>> for post-structuralism--all we can know is language and we cannot even
>> know that.  (
>
>
>     My goodness, how much searching  has come from ten minutes of typing
>between giving tutorials! I am more than flattered. 
>Perhaps all this should not take us by surprise
>when we consider two more named referances for Oedipa and Pierce. 
>
>    Firstly, as Jeff Krafft reminds me, "Marty Popps pointed out
>about 20 years ago ("Perpetual Motions"), citing that line near the end of
>Lot 49 in which Oedipa thinks of Pierce and a "fraction of him that
>couldn't come out even," but "would carry forever beyond any decimal
>place she might name," that Pierce Inverarity is pi."
>
>PI!
>
>   And secondly, Oedipa's nickname, Oed, is of course OED---the
>Oxford English Dictionary; containing, in theory, all words
>extant in the language (although Puhewwwarrrrmate isn't there yet.) 
>
>    So Oed gives us a kind of totality of language, even as
>as PI's infinity, should in theory, be a kind of numerical 
>endlessness. 
>
Awesome.

davemarc