VLVL [8] When BV possessed her

[Paul Mackin]

In trying to answer Jody's post I'd first say that in my own question
about how good is Frenesi as a symbol of student movements I was
including the fact that, though there was a REAL radical student movement
in the U.S. as well as in Europe which climaxed in '68, the Peoples
Republic of Rock and Roll is only a depiction. That's all I meant by
"symbol . . . of the . . . imagined." So the Peoples Republic of Rock
and Roll is as good an imagined event that might be symbolized as any
but whatever Oedipa was seeking in the earlier book would be just as
good. I would agree with Jody that the test of time is the only test by
which we can know whether enthusiams of the past were shadow or
substance. On the side of student movements I might add that by
some accounts the failure of '68 in France was partly responsible for a
new paradign in literary criticism, which is pretty momentous I guess even
allowing for a bit of exaggeration. Don't know if I've gotten to the the
true point of Jody's question. My motive all along has been to try to
figure out what in the name of heaven does Frenesi "mean."

			P.