MDMD[5] p. 155 (Clocks amd Time)

[barleydog at earthlink.net]

       In the Chapter 14 Questions, Eric Weinstein comments:
 >Clearly, the measurement of time and location
>in precise figures goes a long way to turning the pursuits of the
>Enlightenment into the power of Industrial capitalism. Time is money.
>But I also read Pynchon’s uses of Time as being in the service of Being—
>i.e. a la Heidegger. Remember the clocks that wanted, in a physical 
>way, to chime in with the Ocean, even though they did not know
>what the Ocean was? Any to stir up or comment on the possible 
>dialectic?

And I add:

In M & D, Pynchon seems preoccupied with clocks.  It made me re-read a
section of Daniel Boorstin's "The Discoverers."  He has a whole section on
the changing notions of time and its relationship to the development of sea
exploration and an industrialized economy.
        
Of note is Chapter 6 "Making Time Portable" in which Boorstin describes the
European countries  competing for a method of finding longitude, and the
need for an accurate timepiece which would withstand the motion and moisture
of a sailing ship:
                "The Dutch, who now had outposts far eastward on Asian
shores, more than ever felt the need for better defining longitude, the need
for a seafaring clock."
Before the clock, longitude could only be determined by tricky mathematical
calculations based on the moon (discovered, in fact by Maskelyne!).  There
was also an intense rivalry between the Dutch and English:
                "If his device had been patented, it might have made Hoke's
fortune. Fellow scientists, including Robert Boyle and William Brouncker,
the first president of the Royal Society (!), both wealthy men, wanted to
back the project.  But Hooke retreated when they could not satisfy every
last one of his demands. In 1674, when his Dutch competitor, Huygens,
actually made a watch with a balance spring, Hooke was outraged and accused
Huygens of stealing his invention."

        Chapter 7 begins the history of "The Missionary Clock."  It
describes the influence of Jesuits within the Ming Dynasty:  
        "Ricci and Jesuit missionaries who came after him used their
knowledge of astronomy and the calendrical sciences to secure influences
within the Chinese government."  (p. 61)
He describes the Imperial court's fascination with the mechanical clocks.
Not so much as timekeepers, but as mechanical toys. The section goes on to
speculate why the clock became a centerpiece for European civilization and
only a curious novelty for the Chinese civilization.

        Pynchon describes the usefulness of clocks in interrogations.  And
Boorstin points out that accurate clocks provided a public unit that made it
possible for people to be, for the first time, "on time:"
        "By the late seventeenth century, when clocks were not uncommon
among the literate and wealthy, the word "punctual"-which formerly had
described a person who insisted upon points (fromt the Latin punctus,
"points") or details of conduct-came to describe a person who was exactly
observant of an appointed time."  (p. 72)
He also points out the effects of the clock on Western cosmology (Deism,
universe as a clockwork).

        Boorstin's work also has implications for the explorations of the
Celts (discussed in earlier postings).  How did the Celts manage to find
North America without mastering longitude?  Perhaps it was their (and the
Vikings) downfall.
       
         Pynchon does a strange thing to time in his novels.  M & D is
saturated with historical accuracy, and yet history is given a subtle patina
of the surreal.  He is able to warp time  partly by using terminology and
references that make sense both in the historical framework, but which carry
overtones of our own time. I'm thinking of terms like Black Hole (science)
or Simba (Disney).
Certainly this confusion of clocks, exchanging them, clocks as secret
weapons, talking clocks, all-knowing clocks in the center of the Vroom's
lascivious house all chime a relentless obsession with Time.  

                                                David Braden