M&D pg 350 was: Idolatry

[the Robot Vegetable]

From: Andrew Clarke Walser <awalse1 at icarus.cc.uic.edu>

Jules also raises, later in his posting, an interesting question:  Does
the INACCURACY of some of Pynchon's work mar it aesthetically?  Does
Pynchon sacrifice a potentially valuable realism -- one toward which he
seems to lean -- for the sake of cheap literary effects?  And does MASON
AND DIXON reveal a different attitude toward historical "fidelity" than,
say, GRAVITY'S RAINBOW?





	I would argue that he has consciously rejected the idea that
there is "a potentially valuable realism" which can be precisely told.
He speaks through Cherrycoke's and Ethelmer's words:

	"... Who claims Truth, Truth abandons.  History is hir'd, or
coerc'd, only in Interests that must prove ever base.  She is too 
innocent, to be left within the reach of anyone in Powerm-- who but
need to touch her, and all her Credit is in the instant vanishe'd, as
if it had never been.  She needs rather to be tended lovingly and
honorably by fabulists and counterfeiters, Ballad-Mongers and Cranks
of ev'ry Radius, Masters of Disguise to provide her the Costume,
Toilette, and Bearing, and Speech nimble enough to keep her beyond
the Desires, or even Curiosity, of Government. ..."  
	...
	"Hogwash, Sir," Uncle Ives ... "Facts are Facts, ..."
	"I was only pointing out that a single Version, in
proceeding from a single Authority,--"
	...
	"Time on Earth is too precious.  No one has time, for
more than one Version of the Truth."
	"Then let us haveonly Jolly Theatrickals about the Past.
and be done with it,--"

	all pg 350.

	I read this as saying that the past is gone, and even with
a glut of data, we are only guessing at what really went on.  It is
the height of arrogance to promulgate an Official History, or rather
it is a tool of the Powers That Be, and the ballads and novels will
tell a truth closer to what we live.  

	veg