GRGR(12) "Plot" & Comments

[Terrance F. Flaherty]

David Morris wrote:
> 
> >From: "Terrance F. Flaherty"
> >
> [snip]
> >Slothrop is now convinced that he must escape, he lifts a
> >car and drives to Nice. There with the aid of Waxwing's card
> >he acquires papers as an English war correspondent called
> >Ian Scuffing, passage to Zurich, and the address of an
> >underground figure there. So Slothrop is playing different
> >roles here, his most difficult (impossible?) role is perhaps
> >that of Slothrop.
> [snip]
> 
> Role playing is a long established means of learning about one's self.
> Children spend hours in imaginative roles.  They imitate those they admire.
> They try out new attitudes, copy new styles.  This doesn't end with
> childhood, it's just we get more stuck or comfortable in fewer roles.  What
> does it mean to "be yourself?"

Yes, Slothrop may be viewed as attempting Adolescence 
maturity, in Elkind's terms, "personal fable" and 'imaginary
audience" where one attains formal operational thought
through egocentric role playing. Identity, seeing the self
as separate, unique, distinct, is a major problem for
Slothrop, since he is quest and quester, "baited and bait,"
and since the reciprocity between how he conceives himself
and how he perceives others as seeing him, their
expectations of him are distorted, foreclosed, he is becomes
an "illusionist", and all people know of him "is that he
keeps showing up." In a sense, Slothrop has what Erikson
would term "Psycho social Moratorium."   
> 
> >>Slothrop is growing quite accustomed to his role as
> role-player. He has no identity as a conditioned IG Farben
> golem. Later Enzian says, "all we know about you is that you
> keeps showing up.' Shortly, Slothrop will be named (I think
> this the most important scene in the novel) Raketemensch,
> thus having the emptiness of his association with the rocket
> Confirmed and he will gain Celebrity in  the zone. Slothrop
> is the focus of conspiracy and an "illusionist" playing Ian
> Scuffling, Max Schlepzig, Plechazunga. But even his
> celebrity will not keep him give him personality--the sad
> paradox, conditioned personality/no personality or a
> pristine state without "ascribed" personality/no
> personality. His seems to be a quester, an Oedipus, but his
> revelations serve to debilitate and fly apart, and scatter
> like broken rocket parts and the lives they shatter.
> Knowledge seems to bring not renewal, but collapse. Poor
> dude, I am reminded that he once cared, he even prayed
> "conventionally to God...for life to win out. But too many
> were dying, and presently, seeing no point, he stopped."
> Slothrop withdrawn, moving to a dead soul neutrality,
> feelingless. numbed by fear and conspiracy. Here he begins
> to learn of the rocket, Imipolex G, can you imagine, my
> parents? No. My education, god, no I don't pray. As his
> belief, his feelings wane, he learns more of the rocket.
> Remember Slothrop in the casino, through grand simile
> Slothrop equals a rocket:<<
> 
> He is a quester. And he is a survivor.  The roles he takes usually are
> thrust upon him by others as he pushes forward, and he embraces them for the
> food and drugs that come along with.  He is on a very wild ride, but does
> this ride result in a "dead soul neutrality, feelingless?"  Or does it lead
> to a form of transcendance?  When he stops praying, is that a bad thing?


Yes, it's a bad thing not because I pray and you should too,
but Slothrop used to "care and pray for LIFE to WIN." The
first step of withdrawal is neutrality. Slothrop is first
ignorant and afraid, then he gives up, doesn't care, stops
praying to god, neutrality, and will later cause him to ask,
"What do I need that badly?" What can we say of his
relationship to Bianca in this regard? 

Tf