GRGR(2):Lists (WAS: Re:Hours, Towers, and Powers)

[Ebiri1 at aol.com]

<< >
 >>I am sure that there must be some literary term for the use of lists; 
 >>William Carlos Williams had a poem where he enumerated the things in 
 >>layers on his desk (he used a word, if 20+ years ago memory servers 
 >>me, "dendritius" or something like like that, or maybe it just has 
 >>something to do with tooth decay).
 >
 
 >It's called a "congeries."  The novel _Frank's World_ (which has been
 >mentioned before on this list) has one that's 8 pages long!   
                                                          -jm
 
  >>

Some have mentioned the Homeric tradition, and there clearly is an epic
convention in lists (I can't remember if "congeries" is the term for it
specifically).  Milton's enumeration of all the fallen angels in PARADISE
LOST springs to mind.

With the description of Slothrop's desk, Pynchon clearly establishes GR in
the epic tradition (also coupled with the "in medias res" beginning, among
others -- remember, it's just the beginning), but *also* in the mock-epic
tradition.  The epic list is also used by Alexander Pope in "The Rape of the
Lock", using the form to depict the mundane and inglorious.  Slothrop's desk
reminds me of Pope quite a bit, actually.  (I don't have a copy nearby, so I
can't post it...)

The interplay of the epic and the mock-epic poles of GR can also lead to many
other intriguing questions:  For instance, if it *is* an epic, then for what
particular race or civilization or society is it providing a creation myth?
 If it is a mock-epic, is it perhaps depicting the destruction (hint-hint) of
a civilization, rather than the burgeoning of one?  Or could it be both -- a
creation and a destruction all rolled up in one big rocket?

Anyway, this is my first posting to this list, so I hope this makes it.  Cool
stuff.

Cheers,

-Bilge Ebiri