GRGR(16) - Luba (was: Geli/Galina)

[David Morris]

>From: rj 
>
>David M.
> > [snip] For Pynchon to have so blatantly laid out
these pairs 
> > of women w/ birds _should_ have a meaning or
function.
>
>Not sure yet that Luba is just/only/really a bird.
>
>But it occurred to me that Geli had trained, or
*conditioned* that
>("wise", male) owl to attack her unsuspecting suitor
at just the precise
>moment of sexual climax in order to heighten her own
pleasure, perhaps,
>[snip] Whatever, it's a feminist
>winning-back of control from the dominant male, a
subversion of the
>patriarchal system, even if only momentarily, even if
only in play.

Luba is barely present in the text, and when
mentioned, she is a function of Galina.  She has no
relationship w/ Tchitcherine:

---------
(338.38) tall Galina in her cast-off Army trousers and
gray Cossack shirts... marcelled and soft-faced Luba,
her dear freind... Vaslav Tchitcherine, the political
eye... all agents [...] representing the NTA [...]
----------

Luba represents an aspect of Galina cast as another
person.  She is the feminine which drab, utilitarian
Galina has discarded from her own personality.  Galina
is the new sexless, souless, Soviet drone.  Luba is
her alter-ego:  soft here, sharp there.

----------
(339.28)  Her [Galina's] eyes in iron shadow, the
orbits darkened as if by very precise blows [...] with
desperate Luba about the edges, always, of her room,
at her window, a pretty hawk.  Galina has trined her -
but it's only Luba who fies [...]
----------

David Morris




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