Theatre/theater

[Lycidas at worldnet.att.net]

Mark Wright AIA wrote:
> 
> Howdy
> 
> Dare I suggest that the single instance of the "theater" spelling might
> be a typo?
> 
> No, I suppose I don't dare... wouldn't be prudent, it's heresy. I'd be
> flamed at the stake.
> 
> Mark

I think we can safely say, not a typo. 


Old Matthew Maule, in a word, was executed for the crime of
witchcraft. He was one of the martyrs to that terrible
delusion, which should teach us, among its other morals,
that the influential classes, and those that take upon
themselves to be leaders of the people, are fully liable to
all the passionate error that has ever characterized the
maddest mob. 

Thomas Maule (the son) became the architect of the House of
the Seven Gables. 

Very Pynchon that. Having nailed many a branch to frame I
love this little story. Pynchon, I am convinced, loved this
little story too. As I turn back to the stories I know he
read in his youth, I realize how important a few stories are
to Pynchon. I know that V. and to lesser extent both GR and
M&D reveal that Pynchon read Melville and took copious
notes. 

Among other good for nothing properties and privileges, one
was especially assigned them--that of exercising an
influence over people dreams. The Pyncheons, if all stories
are true, haughtily as the bore themselves in the noonday
streets of their native towns, were no better than bond
servants to these plebeian Maules, on entering the
topsy-turvy commonwealth of sleep. Modern psychology, it may
be, will endeavor to reduce these alleged necromancies
within a system, instead of rejecting them as altogether
fabulous.  

Hand-nailers rule, 

TF