GRGR(1-2): Iron
Alan Westrope
awestrop at crl.com
Tue Oct 15 13:38:34 CDT 1996
On Tue, 24 Sep 1996, David Evers wrote:
>What's the deal with all the _iron_ in the first section?
>Previous readings have conditioned me to expect the wood/coal/tar
>business, with the later links to Gravity, organic synthesis and so on,
>but the iron's got me stumped.
For reasons that are unclear to me, iron seems to be identified with
The Rocket; hence, also with "old Mister fucking Death he self,"
beginning with Pirate/Slothrop's dream of the Evacuation. (And yeah,
the idea that Pirate is having Slothrop's dream makes sense to me.)
A Gloamingesque grep for 'iron' produces these examples from section 1,
which David already mentioned:
p. 3 - "Above him lift girders old as an iron queen"
p. 4 - (3 times in 10 lines) "It is some vast, very old and dark
hotel, an iron extension of the track and switchery by which
they have come here....Globular lights, painted a dark green,
hang from under the fancy iron eaves, unlit for centuries [...]
the evacuees are taken in lots, by elevator -- a moving wood
scaffold open on all sides, hoisted by old tarry ropes and
cast-iron pulleys whose spokes are shaped like Ss."
[or like the integral symbol in calculus, eh?]
p. 7 - "How could there be a winter -- even this one -- gray enough
to age this iron that can sing in the wind"
Continuing with section 2, we come to the marvelous paragraph on p. 26,
part of the analepsis to the *first V-2 attack* on Sept. 8, 1944 --
thanks to Steven Weisenburger for this info -- which begins,
"It was one of those great iron afternoons in London"
And, while glancing through the book to get a better idea of the GRGR
schedule, I noticed the full text of the sentence on p. 60 that conludes
our section 4:
"Death has come in the pantry door: stands watching them,
iron and patient, with a look that says _try to tickle me_."
It should prove interesting to keep watching for iron (and rust) as we
continue our voyage.
ps -- I know reading ahead is bad form, but, hey, it's only one sentence,
I spotted it purely by accident, and I hope it's not grounds for expulsion
from the list, denial of (hypothetical) tenure, flogging, or worse. :-)
--
Alan Westrope PGP public key: http://www.crl.com/~awestrop
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