MDMD(8) Questions

[Christine Karatnytsky]

Here are some points to consider.  Contributions from Andrew Dinn
indicated as:  (AD).

Plot summary and openers to follow later today.

Chris

228.7 - 228.8  "As a member of the Society of Jesus, he has been in and
out of some all but intolerable taverns.."  Why is this the case?

228.7 `old Back-to-Front'  Clearly refers to Emerson but any
explanations???  (AD)

229.3 `glaur' as mentioned in MDMD(7)  Meaning ???  (AD)

229.20 `all in a G-dawful Uproar'  G-dawful???  (AD)

229.30 `incomprehensibly and perversely, in willful denial of God's
Disposition of Time and Space, preferring 365 and a Quarter'  Well why
not?  (AD)

230.17  "Why, teach thy Grandam to grope Ducks...?"  Eh?  Can this be
proverbial, or is it a case of ironic prescience?

231.16 - 231.18  "for Christ's true Pity lies so beyond us, that we may
best jump and whimper like Dogs who cannot quite catch the Trick of it." 
What is Christ's true pity?  What does this remark reveal of Fr. Maire
and Pynchon's attitudes towards him?  (It is significant to consider this
question in terms of Dogs we have encountered.)

231.24  "the long sorry Silence"  To what does Emerson refer here?

231.35 `Cudgel and Throck'  Sh OED does not list Throck ???  (AD)

232.35 - 233.2  "In the days of the '45,--guessing that the Young
Pretender would travel everywhere he could by way of those secret Tunnels
known to Papists from ancient times, which ran from most parish Churches
away to other points of interest..."  What's all this about?  Who's the
Young Pretender? 

233.25 `all bearing true as an Italian Miner's Compas'  Are these
underground passages related to Ley lines?  (AD)

233.22 `"Ahrahr AHR ahrahrahr," adds Lud, years later, in the Cudgel
and Throck'  Why is Lud adding to a description of his and Dixon's
first encounter when the description is a flashback not mentioned in
the previous or ensuing dialogue?  (AD)

233.31  "master'd the arts of Pluto"  What might they be?  How would they
be mastered?
  
234.35 `Funnel-Cake' ???  (AD)

235.29 `Cicinelli' ???  (AD)

236.8 `Bourquelet and Nynauld' ???  (AD)

241.30 - 241.31  "I'm but getting on with it, Jeremiah,--and so ought
thee..."  Where have we heard these words before?

242.5 `Humlock' ???  (AD)

242.10 `King's yellow' OED has king's blue = cobalt blue but not
king's yellow???  (AD)

243.17  "the collier Mary and Meg"  What about these names?

243.18 `riding atop a Huddock' ???  (AD)

243.23 `young Dodd, the Peedee' ???  (AD)

243.27 `Tagareen Man' ???  (AD)

244.26 `strikes of '43 and '50'   Anyone know the relevant history?  (AD)

248.21  "Another Slave-Colony"  What *was* known about the American slave
trade at this time?  As far as Mason and Dixon are concerned, it is only
a grim rumor.

249.9  "all Resentments by Star-light heal'd"  This sounds something like
a line from a religious hymn.  Is it?

250.27 - 250.28  "Ye may take a boy out of the Country...but never the
Country out of the Boy."  Can this proverb be attributed to anyone? 
(I've looked, but can't  find a source.)

251.9 `as Chauncey said when the Bums came in'  Chauncey???  (AD)

251.27  "Bombazines"?

252.34  "And I thought 'twas a Spheroid...?"  Where did we here this
before and why does it bear repeating?






  




236.8 `Bourquelet and Nynauld' ???  (AD)