GRGR(3) 50.31 Love Pointsman Style

[CLAY JONATHAN D]

> 
> Before and after the two paragraphs that begin at 50.31, Pointsman is
> referred to in third person.  Is Ed the 'you' in these two paragraphs?
> If so, who is the narrative voice? Is it the same voice switching
> persons? Why the switch to 'you?

It could be that this is a device similar to the one used by the 
left-wing Scottish modermist Lewis Grassic Gibbon in novels such as 
_Grey Granite_  in which he does pretty much the same thing. That is 
to say, there are passages in which characters are addressed as "You" 
(I forget off hand whether the "Y" is capitalized) as they go about 
their business. In the case of GR it's slightly more complex as it 
seems to be a retrospective, eroticized and almost dreamlike 
sequence, but I think the basic effect is much the same. That is, 
something almost (but not exactly) the opposite of Brecht's 
alienation effect, a kind of identification effect that goes beyond 
Pointsman's own self-image into an area around his 
(semi)subconscious. I don't like Freud personally, but to make use of 
his metaphors, it's like the ego levelling accusations at the id. 
Approximately.

"Bewildering spring, and by the Auvezere
Poppies and day's eyes in the green email
Rose over us"      
              "Near Perigord", Ezra Pound

Jon Clay - [cj833 at greenwich.ac.uk]