GR/Pynchon newbie question

[Brendan Foreman]

On Mon, 5 May 1997, David Casseres wrote:

> Origenes sez
> >Can someone offer me any explanations as to what the Kirghiz Light is?  
> 
> One of those Grails Pynchon talks about so much that when you've finished 
> the book and still not found out *what the fuck it actually is*, you 
> become convinced you've missed a whole passage.  But no, it really isn't 
> there.  Tchitcherine knows but you don't, na na na na naaa na!
> 
> I did notice, though, that after not being mentioned for a few hundred 
> pages it suddenly gets mentioned again in the Raketenstadt passage near 
> the end of the book, and it's in close conjunction with two other Lights: 
> the fires of the Rocket, and the glare of the Bomb.

I was always under the impression that it was referring to the mysterious
explosion that occurred in Siberia in 1908.  It's thought to have been a
comet impacting the Earth.  But looking it up in the atlas, I see that
Kirghiz is (or was) an area just northeast of Afghanistan.  So, I guess
that's wrong.

-Brendan