[M&D] possible spoilers - 1st chapter

[Chris Sweet]

Alan Westrope wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 29 Apr 1997, Greg Montalbano wrote:
> 
> >Chris Sweet comments:
> 
>  >>Someone on the list mentioned how M&D might be similar to
>  >>The Sot-weed Factor. One of the things that has struck me
>  >>after finishing the first chapter is the twins, Pliny &
>  >>Pitt. While SWF's Eben and Anne Cooke were not twins they
>  >>might as well have been and twins permeate Barth's other
>  >>fiction. Any thoughts?      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>    ^^^^^^^                     [emphasis mine -- AW]
> 
> >Let me be the first nitpicker to point out that Eben & Anna WERE, most
> >definitely, twins;  one of the more directly self-relflexive passages early
> >in the book states that Nature had seen fit to alter his features subltly
> >from hers to a more gargoylish mien, "just as a clever author, through
> >subtle alterations, can make a ridiculous parody of a beautiful style."
> 
> Correct.  BTW, Barth has a twin sister, whom he mentions in "Some Reasons
> Why I Tell the Stories I Tell The Way I Tell Them Rather Than Some Other
> Sort of Stories Some Other Way" (reprinted in _The Friday Book_).
> 

Yikes. My apologies. I read SWF about ten years ago and I guess my
memory of
it is failing.

I believe Barth's second wife is a twin as well.

-chris