GW, hepcat

[calbert at pop.tiac.net]

Don't know whether the line between Focus of Sobriety and incompetent 
Fool is drawn on the knowledge of Yiddish declensions. I see it more 
as the kind of thing someone might do in the course of some 
potsmoking bonding ritual thinking it was cool.
I will not state with academic certainty that my interpretation 
(subliminally pirated from jmascaro,sorry, buddy) is correct, it just 
seems a simpler, thereby, in my mind, more likely explanation.
I apologize if I made the term hep cat seem entirely derogatory -  
CAB CALLOWAY LIVES!
love,
cfa, who has actually heard the Man do Flat 
Foot Flugie (not live) 

> So, on the one hand Pynchon writes: "If the Colonel serves not as a Focus of
> Sobriety, neither is he quite the incompetent Fool depicted in the London
> press."  Yet, on the other, he twists himself into a pretzel so that we may
> see GW as precisely one such?  
> 
> Interesting.  
> 
> Vaska
> 
> Mascaro wrote:
> >I waded through your not-so-inelegant prose to find that I agree w/ your
> > GW riff. I stated this as one of the options (though I didn't
> > develop it w/ the verve you do) in my first reply to Siegel's
> > *ignorant error* slam.  Folks didn't seem to give the possibility
> > (i.e. that it's GW's slip) much credence, but after your quik take,
> > I'd say it was a likely reading.
> >
> >
> >john (obviously not reading his posts in chronological order) m
> >****************************
> >from cfa (quoting for clarity--there's a lot of noise out here t'day)
> ><snip>
> >
> >> Consider the following, the Gershom- 
> >>Washington relationship as  another example of the TRP high/low  
> >>game. Throughout  the passage there seems to be an effort to 
> >>characterize Washington as something less than the man of the world 
> >>he would perceive himself to be. In fact, there is reason to 
> >>believe that he is a good deal less cosmopolitan than his putative 
> >>servant. For example, Gershom is described as having a career in 
> >>"showbiz" (G is also described as a Canaanite, I'll leave it to more 
> >>qualified voices to elaborate on the Canaanite/Jewish connection, 
> >>would this make him a colonial Sammy Davis Jr.?) that has afforded 
> >>him the opportunity to travel the colonies and amass a wealth 
> >>comparable to that of his master. He does not appear too servile, and 
> >>has no qualms about questioning his "masters" investment suggestions 
> >>in a quite "cheeky" manner - IN FRONT OF GW'S GUESTS.
> >>When attributing the invention of the punch they are drinking W. 
> >>tells his guests that it was the work of "my Man Gershom". Though 
> >>this could be read very literally, what if we contracted the phrase 
> >>to "m' man G.", mimicking current street vernacular? By so doing we 
> >>can see W as a hep pretender, a type with which I am sure we are all 
> >>familiar. In this vein it would be very reasonable to expect that his 
> >>use of "meshugginah" is in the same spirit. It is the WASP trying to 
> >>sound cool by appropriating the terminology of what his group might 
> >>consider a lower, yet infinitely fascinating order, and doing so 
> >>incorrectly. Such an interpretation does not leave us debating to 
> >>what degree TRP pooched in his use of Yiddish. Why would a writer 
> >>with his reputation for accuracy not be able to find the correct form 
> >>of a relatively commonly used term? I hate to generalize, but are we 
> >>to believe that the drafts to M&D had never been read by anyone 
> >>jewish - in the world of New York publishing? To ascribe this to 
> >>error would be a considerable undertaking; to view it shorn of 
> >>personal projections and biases as a simple literary technique is not 
> >>only feasible, but to this intellectual plankton, the most reasonable 
> >>course.
> >>This interpretation suffers only two major drawbacks, 
> >>a) it deprives Jules (sorry buddy, but I think you are on the wrong 
> >>track with this) of a cudgel with which to pummel trp for a lack of 
> >>sensitivity (don't give up, there will surely be other opportunities)
> >>b) it robs Vaska, whose pronouncements on this has set new standards 
> >>for "self-embossed bombast", of the altitudinous perch from which she 
> >>has chosen to defecate on the Man.
> >>My profound thanks to those who have patiently waded through my 
> >>inelegant prose to get to this point.
> >
> >
> 
> 
>