GRGR3: Discussion Opener for Section 3

[Andrew Dinn]

Foax,

Ok, so GRGR(2) completed and we move on to discuss setion 3 and read
section 4. Discussion of section 3 and reading of section 4 will
continue from today until 1st November.

As usual, I have come up with a few questions or topics which struck
me as worth following up which I will present below.  Remember, if any
of you have suitable texts, graphics or audio clips mail me (or the
list if they are a reasonable size) and I will install them under the
GRGR WWW page at

    http://www.cee.hw.ac.uk/~andrew/pynchon-group-read.html

I'll note in passing that Alvaro Fernandes has posted me a card which
contains a delightful image of a rocket taken from a Ufa poster for
Fritz Lang's film `Die Frau im Mond' which I will be making available
via a link from the above page some time later today.

Before I provide some opening comments on section 3, I'll remind you
that section 4 is on pp 42-60 of the Viking/Penguin edition of GR.
The opening words are

    Tonight's quarry, whose name will be Vladimir [. . .]

and the closing words are

    [. . .] with a look that says try to tickle me.


The WWW address given above also contains full details of the group
reading tour, instructions for passengers and a full trip itinerary
indicating all major ports of call.

Before posting my openers let me explain that I have produced myself a
little line counter to help pinpoint GRGR references. The Viking/
Penguin edition has 40 or 41 lines per page (that's logical lines -
i.e. including the blank ones between paragraphs - rather than actual
printed lines). I have a piece of card with 41 ticks down the side and
I am using it to identify the line number for each citation. So, if I
write pp.ll after a reference (where pp and ll are numbers) that means
page pp, line ll.

Now here are the openers for GRGR(3):

1)  `sensitive flame' (29.35) This is a term used of a Bunsen burner
    flame (is it Bunsen's term?). It suggests that the inanimate flame
    is actually animate or sentient, as does the continuation where it
    `registers visitors as they enter and leave' and the later
    reference when it `dives for shelter' (31.14) when the bomb drops.
    Any comments on this inanimate/animate theme?

2)  Why is TRP including all this spiritualist, voodoo shit?

3)  "West indians softly plaiting vowels round less flexible chains of
    Russian-Jewish conconants. . . ." (30.5) This regards language (or
    just speech?) as a sort of chemistry of phonemes, nix? This is
    just a TRP joke, no? a systematic, totalising account of
    non-systematic, fragmented phenomena? Like elsewhere in GR? Or
    not?

4)  "Most skate tangent to the holy circle, some stay, some are off
    again to other rooms" (30.7) Why is the seance ring `holy'?

5)  "reddish-brown curls tightening close as a skull-cap" Why skullcap?
    Is this a covert reference to Judaism? the Kabbala? soemthing else?

6)  "Once transected into the realm of Dominus Blicero [. . .]". (30.12
    onwards) This is Peter Sachsa speaking through Carroll Eventyr to
    Selena about Rioland feldspath, yes? (see 31.25 for
    confirmation). Is this paragraph all just hot air (personal wind!)
    or does it mean something?

7)  "It's control. All these things arise from one difficulty: control"
    (30.26) "the Invisible Hand" (30.30) Is this a major policy in
    GR's manifestoor just a throwaway introduced merely to set up a
    sneer at psychology or 'uspenskian nonsense'? (30.31). Remember
    that `Invisible hand' becomes visible, to Slothrop at least, when
    it materialises later on with a ponting middle finger sayign this
    way to the `Rocket cartel'.

8)  The "lady" and the "dock-worker" (30.37) - just someone out for a
    bit of rough?

9)  Jessica `Swanlake' (30.39) Swan lake? Where the hell does this come
    from? Is it just a joke?

10) 30.39 onwards and also 31.19-31.21 rapidly establish a character
    for Jessica with incredible economy. Is this the Jess we know and
    love from later on, though?

11) "Brass throats and breasts warm to her blood, quake in the hollow
    of here hand [. . .] feathered crosses" (31.8) These darts are
    also animate, alive like birds. Just had to mention this passage
    because it is so incredibly erotic and beautiful. If you have not
    fallen in love with Jessica after the first paragraph you ought to
    have done by now. And even the hardest-hearted of you will swoon
    when she throws that dart at 31.19.

12) "Milton Gloaming cocks an eyebrow. His mind, always gathering
    correspondences, thinks it has found a new one" (31.22) i.e. with
    Slothrop's bulls-eyes. This also implies a certain sexual content
    in MG's watching. So, is Jessica similar to Slothrop? (an ddoes
    that make Roger akin to Katje et al)? Or is this a false
    correlation (a statistical freak!).

13) "four-way entente" (31.24) Imagine this as a diamond shape. Roland
    at the top and Selena at the bottom vertex define an axis for
    information flow/communication. In the physical world the
    communication is effected by Carroll Eventyr. But in terms of who
    is supposed to be participating in the discourse it is actually
    Peter Sachsa who is speaking, telling Selena about Roland, the
    subject of the communication. So, Eevntyr and Sachsa sit at the
    left and right vertices of the diamond. Each side of the diamond
    from top to bottom via one or other vertex represnets a
    communication path, along one of which flow sounds in one case,
    meaning in the other.

    Also, relate this image to the novel. You the reader read about
    the characters and events in the book. The narrator(s) apparently
    tell you the story but it is really Pynchon who produces the words
    which you are reading. So, the subject of the book corresponds to
    Roland, the subject of Sachsa's discourse. The narrator in the
    book is Sachsa. Eventyr like Pynchon actually produces the words
    and Selena is you, the reader.

    Finally, what about those names. Feldspath - seems to relate to
    the mineral feldspar. Roland? No idea unless this is his swansong,
    a belated chanson d'amour! In which case it's all getting a bit
    too romantic. Eventyr is a Norse(?) word for adventure. Selena is
    the moon. Anyone want to sculpt something out of this junk?

14) "develop a vocabulary of curves" (32.1) Ironic choice of word
    there? or something else?

15) "Zipf's principle of least effort" (32.5) is this just the
    linotype layout principle that you put the most frequent cases
    near to hand? Or is it a more general principle in coding theory?

16) "a crown and anchor game with which chance has very little to do"
    (32.25) Is this a snide dig at the "control" problem? i.e. when it
    comes down to it people put their effort into controlling the
    immediate and partial aspects of their lives, not the totality of
    things. What is `crown and anchor' by the way?

17) "Pirate wants Their trust [. . .] He wants understanding from his
    *own* lot" (33.19) This suggests that "They" are his own lot, no?
    Part of his own personal or local Them system which these psi
    types do not share. The comment about "class nervousness" above
    (32.33) also suggest that the Eagle of Tooting idoes not fit in
    here. But why romance his own Them system? Is it that he loves the
    routine of his own paranoia or is he scared to lose it.

18) "that stateless lascar across his own mirror-gass, taht poorest of
    exiles" (35.14) Pirate or TRP?

19) I've already talked about the way that the interlude with Roger
    and Jessica is structured on pages 37-42. It starts and ends with
    them in the car, with narrative and dialogue and we drift in and
    out of Roger and Jess's thoughts and then into scenes from the
    past which contain their own narrative, dialogue and rendering of
    the mental. With each paragraph, or even individual lines, analyse
    who is saying what where and when (or who is being narrated as an
    indirect way of having them say it). How many narrators are there?
    Is there anything which is too confusing or does nto work?

20) "through Roger's mineral, grave-marker self" si this the
    animate/inanimate theme again? (and how does it relate to `a soul
    in every stone'? Is there also, therefore, `a stone in every
    soul'?)

21) "They are in love. Fuck the war" (42.2) Is this just hippy-dippy
    naivety? Or can you really say this? Compare it with Pirate's
    embarrassed, half-acknowledged sympathetic spurt `He is suddenly,
    dodderer and ass, taken by an ache in his skin, a simple love for
    them both that asks nothing but their safety. and that he'll
    always manage to describe as something else -- "concern", you
    know, "fondness. . . .'  (35.22).  Aaaaaahhhhhhhhh.  Choke.  Sob.
    Sniff, sniff.


Andrew Dinn
-----------
And though Earthliness forget you,
To the stilled Earth say:  I flow.
To the rushing water speak:  I am.