Theatre/theater?

[davidm at hrihci.com]

> From: Lycidas at worldnet.att.net
> 
> [snip]with Enzian, we
> are presented with a character trying to figure things out:
> "Enzian would like to be more out of the process than he
> is..their time, their space...But it is their time, their
> space...naively, outcomes the white continuum grew past
> hoping for centuries ago...he can't handle all of them at
> the same time...moments of reverie of honest despair, that
> he is speaking lines prepared somewhere far away (not far
> away in any space, but in levels of power) and that his
> decisions are not his own at all...." 326-329 too long to
> quote
> 
> Enzian is still in the process, BUT he is aware of this and
> he would like to be out of it. Remember when Katje attempts
> to warn Slothrop that his volition, his penis, is not his
> own? Slothrop wants to hold onto something of Katje that is
> directed by Them. Enzian (unlike Slothrop, who is now moving
> from "paranoia" by one "heresy" to "anti-paranoia" where
> nothing is connected), is here rejecting the hero role
> (Slothrop's mock hero role in contrast or the christ
> allegory) and wants to stay close to the "zero" or in a
> consciousness between "paranoia and "anti-paranoia."
> Remember that Slothrop has no idea of time and space. Enzian
> understands that in the zone their is no time and space,
> only Their time and Their space, a time and space that They
> project onto the four (I will explain these if you like)
> realms of the zone.

Please do explain the "four realms of the zone."  North, South, East, West?

Enzian is not exactly "rejecting" the hero role, is he?  He bears it, yet
reluctantly.  He is on a quest, that much he knows, and he also knows he is
following THEIR technology for its transcendent underlying/overarching
meaning.  He is desperately seeking meaning, and senses that by his tracing
the Rocket he has put himself on THEIR path, thus he becomes only an actor
in Their passion play.  Slothrop also realizes, now and then, that he has
placed himself on Their journey, and he also realizes that it's only his own
inertia which keeps him following it.  He is free, but he places himself on
Their Ship  He knows better, but then he's swept off on another adventure,
not exactly reluctantly.  Enzian, though, is fully prepared to leave the
Rocket-quest for any other "text" which promises the way to the Truth.  He
is committed to figuring it all out.

> However, Enzian is naive in that he
> expects the white continuum, and he is still overwhelmed by
> the details, the diversity, and the dreams of the white
> North. This diversity is what drives characters to impose
> some order--often religious, metaphysical, scientific-- onto
> experience, but the order they impose, leads to
> anihilation--either total control or total synthesis, but in
> any event loss of self or identity.

Enzian was snow-blinded, mesmerized, by Blicero and his Rilke.  Now he's
trying to find the Center.  In some ways he is also like a rocket sent into
the zone by Blicero.

David Morris
 
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