GRGR(4) kenosha kid

[Cjhurtt6 at aol.com]

interesting. but, i think it's kind of superficial. i dont see enough here to 
suggest that orson "is" the kid. the connections here seem rather tenuous.

 
 (1) As has been pointed out (I think by Tony Tanner, but I could be
      wrong) it may be a reference to the framing narrative of 
     _Citizen Kane_, in which journalists try to trace the meaning of 
     Kane's life in terms of his dying word: "Rosebud!" They fail, not 
     realising that Rosebud, Kane's sled as a child, is both too profound 
     and too simplistic a key to unlocking Kane's life. So too with _GR_: 
     the Kenosha Kid reference is TRP's coded warning not to try to 
     apprehend the text through the pursuit of single references
 (carrying 
     on this theme from Oedipa's futile attempt to become a whizz at 
     researching strange references from obscure Jacobean melodramas).
 The 
     huge irony is that we have to pursue the meaning of the Kenosha Kid 
     reference to understand the message. Goddamn but this book is
 CLEVER!
  (2) Of course Welles' other great achivement was his splendid radio 
      adaptation of H G Wells' _The War of the Worlds_, broadcast on 
      October 30 1938 and spooking, it is estimated, about 1 million
 people 
      who thought it was a real broadcast about a real alien invasion... 
      (Check out my review of an audiocassette release of this broadcast
 in 
      the rec.arts.books.sf archives if you're interested, foax). Hang on
 a 
      mo - what do we have here? Cylindrical shapes raining from the sky 
      bringing death, the confusion between reality and fantasy, maybe
 (as 
      happens with the Schwarzkommando) a bit of fantasy breaking off and 
      entering the real world? Are we talking about Welles or Pynchon
 here? 
      The two have a lot in common, it would seem. Chances are that 
      Slothrop coulda been listening in that halloween night...
 
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