GRGR(9): Yellow handkerchief

[David Morris]

>From: Jeremy Osner
>On p. 184, Slothrop "produces a gaudy yellow, green and orange display
>handkerchief, and ... arranges it in his friend's jacket pocket so as to
>stick out in three points." I'm not totally clear on
>(1) whether he is at this point wearing Tantivy's Norfolk jacket
Yes, over top of that gaudy Hawaiian shirt.
>(2) if so, is he putting the handkerchief in the jacket he's wearing?

Yes, he (Slothrop)is wearing his friend's (Tantivys) jacket.  Tantivy, 
appalled at the prospect of being seen in public w/ Slothrop in that 
Hawaiian shirt, has Slothrop put on his Norfolk jacket, which is white, I 
presume.  Reading the text a little closer brings out some Biblical 
references:
----------
(184.13)  Sacrifice indeed:  the coat is from a Saville row establishment 
whose fitting rooms are actually decorated with portraits of all those 
venerable sheep - some nobly posed upon crags [the butch ones] others in 
pensive, soft close-ups [come fuck me pose] - from whom the original 
fog-silvered wool was sheared.
----------
Slothrop is dressed (shades of the butcher's lingo) as the sacrificial lamb, 
the Passover lamb, the Christ.  Also note Slothrop's comments re. the coat:
----------
(184.18) "Must be woven out of that barbed wire."
----------
Remember Jesus's crown "woven" out of thorns?  Another possible Biblical 
reference going on here relates to the colorful attire Slothrop insists on 
wearing.  Remember the son w/ that coat of many colors whose brothers sold 
him off to slavery.  He also was a Christ-figure who later delivered his 
family out of famine.

Its amazing how Pynchon can code all this into a comedy scene...

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