Fidel & Cuba

[Craig Clark]

Greg Montalbano asks:

> Pynchon's characters DO go through changes (animate to inanimate comes to
> mind);  but can anybody give me an example of a character who ascends to
> power through "revolutionary" means & is or is not corrupted?

What about the Slothrop clan? William, as a Puritan in non-Puritan 
England, is on the Outside, so travels to America; there he exiles 
himself from the Inside with his pamphlet on preterition; nonetheless 
the Slothrops live long and prosper to become mandarins of Amerika, 
the new Elite, on the Inside... I realise this doesn't quite 
correspond with what Greg's looking for, but it's still an 
interesting example (and will those Slothrops appear in _M&D_?)

Craig Clark

"Living inside the system is like driving across
 the countryside in a bus driven by a maniac bent
 on suicide."
   - Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"