GRGR (17): german samples

[Paul Mackin]

On Thu, 6 Jan 2000, Lorentzen / Nicklaus wrote:

>   "der meistersinger" (361) - must be the plural form "die meistersinger" (this 
>   mistake is, according to weisenburger, corrected in the bantam edition). 
>   refers to Wagner's opera "the master-singers from nuremberg" [1868 (not, as   
>   Weisenburger says, 1863)].

Has it ever occurred to anybody that Pynchon is imagining himself as
being in a kind of Meistersinging contest in which the object is to render
the German language correctly--so that the error might have been
intentional, to allow the reader to take part in a game similar to the one
incorporated into the opera, that being the pointing out of mistakes (in
singing).

			P.