Missing parts

[JULIUS RAPER]

Terrance,
	The last part means that it appears to be the narcissistic desire
for immortality that causes TRP's characters to try to replace frail human
parts with ivory or metal or stone--or to identify with seemingly
omnipotent weapons, abstract theories, and non-human robots.  Probably a
theme he picked up from Henry Adams, who calls it a primary drive, one
underlying sex and religion. 
	Pynchon appears more interested in preserving the human element,
thereby leaving immortality to the artists who chance upon it, not by will
or programme but by gift and circumstance.  
					JRR



On Fri, 20 Aug 1999, Terrance F. Flaherty wrote:

>  
> 
> JULIUS RAPER wrote:
> > 
> > Terrance,
> >         A good point.  But each addition to the body has to go somewhere
> > and so, in the language of V. (the book), represents a falling away from
> > the human that defines a decadence, another narcissistic attempt to swap
> > the human for the inflated dreams of immortality. Is this not so?
> >                                 Best, Jack
> 
> 
> Yes, I agree with the first half of your statement-- "each
> addition to the body has to go somewhere and so, in the
> language of V. (the book), represents a falling away from
> > the human that defines a decadence"--- but, while don't diagreeing with the second part, I'm not sure what it means. 
> 
> "What's automatism, Grovie?"  (S.L. TSI.188)
> TF
> 
> 
> > 
> > On Wed, 18 Aug 1999, Terrance F. Flaherty wrote:
> > 
> > >
> > >
> > > Pynchon seems more interested in added parts. This interest is evident in his
> > > early work--betwixt V. and CL--"The Secret Integration." In said story we find
> > > the Slothrops and Carl Barrington, an "imaginary" friend and double of Carl
> > > McAfee. Carl is made of junk and all the "possibilities turned away from." He
> > > is a robot of ballistics theory, science and invention, and following V.
> > > becomes Increasing an Abstraction and Increasing Inanimate, until he is
> > > scattered and abandoned "to the old estate's other attenuated ghosts." Sort of
> > > like our American Rocket Man!
> > >
> > >
>