v o r t e x //: grgr (28): cosmic windmill mandala (--- "graphicity" in pynchon's prose)

[Lorentzen / Nicklaus]

david schrieb:

> >From: lorentzen-nicklaus at t-online.de
> >
> >>  this cosmic windmill mandala (- & once more there is jungian 
> >>"quadricity")on page 624 made me think of the function of "graphicity" [?] 
> >>in pynchon's work.<<
> >>
> >>in v we have all the vs in the chapter headlines, the kilroy (436) and the 
> >>hands (471f.).<<
> >>
> >>in col49 there is on page 34 the posthorn (- "a loop, triangle and 
> >>trapezoid")that reappears on page 58.<<
> >>
> >>in gr we find the "celluloid margins" in between the chapters, the emblem 
> >>of the schwarzkommando on page 361, the houseboat formula on page 450 and, 
> >>eventually, the mandala sign, which initiated this whole thought of 
> >>mine.<<
> >>
> >>in vineland and m&d there are no graphical signs. why?<<


> Kai,
>
> I don't believe your characterization holds w/ regard to MD.  I remember the 
> "spiral" being a repeated image in MD, though I'd agree that it is much more 
> subtle.  This is from a post of mine way back during the MDMD:
>
> >>From: David Morris <davidm at hrihci.com> Subject: MDMD(19) - The Vortex 
> >>Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1998 09:23:10 -0700
> >>
> >>MD 560.26
> "Gone was the Chance that might have changed my Life.  It lay at the Eye of 
> that Vortex, - to cross the Flow of Time surrounding it, was I oblig'd to 
> aim a bit upstream, or toward the Past, in order to maintain a radial course 
> to the Center."<<
>
> >>Consider the geometry of the vortex:  a  spiral line moving toward an 
> >>ever-receding center, never touching.  This spiral becomes 3D, then 4D, 
> >>because movement, time, is a component.  The vortex describes a space-time 
> >>event in reverse, approaching the origin.<<


  david, thanks for reminding me on this m&d motif. i had to think again of your 
  mail yesterday when i was riding on a train from munich to hamburg & read 
  the following passage from another marvellous novel:

  "someone snatched the old woman's blindfold from her and she and the juggler 
  were clouted away and when the company turned in to sleep and the low fire was 
  roaring in the blast like a thing alive these four yet crouched at the edge of 
  the firelight among their strange chattels and watched how the ragged flames 
  fled down the wind as if sucked by some maelstrom out there in the void, some 
  vortex in that waste apposite to which man's transit and his reckonings alike 
  lay abrogate. as if beyond will or fate he and his beasts and his trappings 
  moved both in card and in substance under consignment to some third and other 
  destiny."
                         (cormac mccarthy: blood meridian [1985], p. 96)

  excellent stuff, right? 
  
  
  in my posting i was refering not to metaphors but to actual graphical signs 
  like the kilroy, the posthorn or the cosmic windmill mandala. in this context 
  i found an interesting passage concerning the significance of visual signs for 
  rdb's collage-book "schnitte" (- composed in 1973, posthumously published in 
  1988). sibylle späth writes: "with his picture-text-montages he here connects 
  himself with the montage-method of people like john heartfield or george grosz 
  by putting the signature of the present through its symbols into picture. with 
  this brinkmann creates "hieroglyphs" (schnitte, p. 105)of the present age, 
  pictoral signs of the properties and state of contemporary culture. more 
  direct, without the dissociating interference of linguistic rationalizations 
  and abstractions, these pictures from objects found in reality strike the 
  observer. with his turning to visual design brinkmann has redeemed the 
  renunciation of language his work is pleading for again and again."   
  (m.o.p.a.t. from sybille späth: rolf dieter brinkmann. sammlung metzler band 
  254. stuttgart 1989. p. 114). and the kid spat.     

  hieroglyphically yours: kai