M&D pg. 325

[the Robot Vegetable]

ray says:

... most helpful idea so far was the one
about cinematic sliding ie a storyteller in a movie begins a tale and we
(the audience) hear first his voice, then see what he's describing (to
his voiceover), then his voice drops away and we're there. if anyone can
pull this off (outside of stephen wright, NOT the comic), it's pynchon.

    The segues are incredible masterful!  This one really charmed me:

    If Mason's elaborate Tales are a way for him to be true to the
sorrows of his own history (the Rev^d Cherrycoke presently resumes),
a way of keeping them safe, and never betraying them, in particular 
those belonging to Rebekah,-- then Dixon's Tales, the Emersoniana, 
the Ghosts of Raby, seem to rise from simple practical matiness.
Who, if not Mason, at any given moment, needs cheering? A cheerful
Party-Chief means a cheerful party.
    "Directly before the Falmouth Packet sail'd," he begings, one
night as they wait for a Star, "William Emerson presented me with
a small Mysterious Package..."

	[pgs 316-317]

    We move from Pynchon's voice through The Rev^d's and into 
hearing Dixon speak.  The voice is clear, the changes clear and
yet seemless.  I stand up and yell Huzzah!
    And, gee, (rushes back to the subject line to up the ante,
    This Mysterious Package,  I suspect, is my great great great
etc grandfather.  The Clockwork Vegetable, indeed!
    Back to that passage above, I didn't notice first time through,
but the use of (...Rev^d C...resumes),  ->  (), instead of (,) is
interesting.
    I took the Book to Lunch.  Laughs flew out and all around stared. 
One strained almost imperceptively to see the Name of the Book.  The 
meal was delicious,  I think. 

	veg