GRGR (15): Good & Evil (with M&D bits)

[Seb Thirlway]

>Good discussion. I've got another question however. What would
the result
>be if we changed the subject of the thread from "Good & Evil" to
>"Pleasure & Pain?"

Much easier to talk about, I think; less risk of being smacked on
the head with an ad absurdum argument invoking REAL child abuse
or the REAL Holocaust.

Evil and good are such theological and philosophical
>notions. Pleasure and pain are more down to earth. So, under the
>new scheme MORALITY would consist in trying to promote pleasure
and
>trying to prevent pain (an optimizing problem, but no matter).

what would this morality have to say about Slothrop, or Mason
with (SPOILER - is being coy about M&D still necessary, by the
way or has everyone read it?) his melancholy obsession with
Rebekah?  Not about their actions, but about what to do towards
them - how would you prevent their pain, and should you?  Just
imagining how Dixon would cope with Slothrop, as an idle fantasy.
Probably get on very well, tho' Dixon might have some hard
thinking to do when he smoaked that what he does out of eager
Curiosity Slothrop does in the grip of Obsession... (sorry
couldn't resist it).

 Thus I
>would I have to rephrase my previously expressed contention as
follow: In
>reading _Gravity's Rainbow_ I do not  find myself really
BELIEVING very
>firmly in the PAIN that is purportedly taking place. And the way
I KNOW I
>do not believe in the pain is that I never find myself WANTING
IT TO STOP.


Yes!  I think the confusion and the pain that goes with that is
more affecting in GR than the instances where pain and
degradation is actually described, the bits where you could stand
back and think "well I wouldn't want to be there" - be Gottfried
or Katje in Blicero's house in Duindigt, for instance.  You don't
want it to stop because they don't want it to stop, or at least
they're not sure.  The only person I can think of who is
unequivocally in pain and wants out of it is Roger Mexico -
because he's "boyish", innocent, I can't remember the exact
description in those terms: he hasn't bought into the War or had
it buy into him, so, fool, he's still childish enough to feel
pain absolutely.
The others - Katje, Slothrop, Gottfried, are much too opaque to
accept empathy as Roger would - they're so compromised (this
isn't a judgment from outside: they're compromised and they know
it, or perhaps they're compromised because they know it, or
perhaps merely suspecting it is enough - maybe nothing was DONE
to Slothrop, maybe all They had to do was to introduce him to the
suspicion that something may have been DONE to him) that they
can't even feel pain wholeheartedly.
- Maybe it isn't pain, maybe I like it, maybe it's all I'm going
to get, maybe my categories of pain and pleasure have been
subverted, secretly in the past or imperceptibly more recently,
maybe the notion of authentic pleasure and pain that is truly
mine is an empty notion by now, if that's a possibility then I'm
not going to identify myself too closely as this person in pain.
I find this much more painful to read about than the pain
itself - as you say, you don't believe in the pain, but it's
still there.  Your morality of trying to prevent pain can do
absolutely nothing in this situation, without being rebuffed -
like Dixon (M&D SPOIL again) goodheartedly hurting Mason by
accident, again and again.  There's very little room for Dixon's
kindness because Mason is never sure either why he's miserable,
whether he's miserable, what Rebekah has to do with it.
Empathising with these characters, wanting their pain to stop,
would be to be a blundering, ignorant, tactless sentimentalist,
foolish and naive enough to believe that the "ache in the skin"
can penetrate at all into a realm you know nothing of and can
never understand fully - if they still don't know whether they're
in pain, who the hell do you the reader think you are offering
sympathy?

"He is suddenly, dodderer and ass, taken by an ache in his
skin, a simple love for them both that asks nothing but
their safety, and that he'll always manage to describe as
something else--"concern," you know, "fondness...."  (thank you
Terrance for this quote)

which feels shameful to Prentice, an emotion that has no place -
and to the reader as well.  Am I getting ahead of the GRGR, or
have we got to Prentice reaching his destination, with the taffy
and the endless corridors? - all about exactly this among other
things IMO, and truly horrible.

just my reading...or rather memory of reading - just bought copy
no.8, keep on lending them out and never get them back.  No
Return.




seb