grgr (34): weissmann's tarot (746f.)

[Lorentzen / Nicklaus]

 "the king of cups, crowning his hopes, is the fair intellectual-king." (749)

 here is something on that i posted in 12/99, answering a mail of rj:

  The King of Cups, fire in water, is described by Crowley as representing "the 
 fast and passionate assault of rain and of sources and, in a narrower sense, 
 the dissolution as power of water" (- retranslated from "The  Book of Thoth"). 
 Doesn't sound like the people you find in corporate board rooms, or? Crowley  
 goes on describing people whose primary pattern is represented by the King (-  
 in his termiology: "Knight")of Cups as "passive", "friendly" and  
 "dilettantish". So you see what I mean. In A.E. Waite's "The Pictorial Key To  
 The Tarot", according to Weisenburger Pynchon's Tarot source, one finds the  
 characterization "business man", rj mentions, and others (- "a blond man",  
 "creative intelligence", "exploitation", "scandal", "injustices", "enormous  
 loss") which could have moved Mr. P. to associate Blicero with this card. But  
 even in Waite's system the card that describes the professional mentality of 
 corporate board room people is, of course, the King of Swords (- fire in air). 
 Waite describes him as "having the power to judge about life and death 
 professionally" (- these are, again, my retranslations). Mentioned qualities: 
 "Power", "authority", "militant intelligence" (sic!), "government powers", 
 "cruelty", "perversion", "evil intentions". So this fits much better to the 
 description we get: "If you're wondering where he's gone, look among the 
 successful academics, the Presidential advisers, the token intellectuals who 
 sit on boards of directors" (p. 749). Did our man make a mistake here?! I don't 
 think so. The other cards are chosen quite well. No, this is, I think, the 
 final reader trap (- obviously the one Terrance has fallen into). 
 Weissmann is NOT the bureaucratic mind par excellence! Always distrusted this 
 buddy like imperative "Look high, not low", by which Pynchon seems to be  
 chumming up to his readers. If it really would be that simple, the novel would 
 loose lots of its complexity. By putting in this "little" mistake,  Pynchon is, 
 at the same time, satirizing classic "conclusive" novel endings and indicating 
 to the close reader that it ain't necessarily so. And so: "He is ALMOST surely 
 there" (- my caps). It's the same complexity bringing effect Mr. P. gets in    
 Vineland by putting in this impressive 'Prairie deeply wanting Brock to come 
 back' scene in the very end ... 

kfl