GRGR(28): Hund-Stadt

[Jeremy Osner]

I'd like to write something longer on the Hund-Stadt; but I don't think
it's going to happen, this week anyways.

Just a note that this little parable captures very clearly and I think
almost explicitly, the erotically sadistic aspect of Pavlovian
conditioning (shorthand for "Pavlovian conditioning as it is presented
in Gravity's Rainbow"); "Kill The Stranger. There may be know way of
distinguishing it from the other given quantities of their lives -- from
hunger or thirst or sex."

The line, "... no one could bring himself to destroy the houses and
shops" (p. 614), didn't quite ring true to me; I mean that's what an
army's all about, right, destroying houses and shops? Whence the
compassion?

Pointsman is researching how to eliminate the dog-city; he's a dog
trainer from way back.

Nice too, how there is a direct transition from the dog-city to Mossmoon
and Marcus with their "idle and bitchy" sadism. Is Marcus suggesting
bestial sex when he says, "Have you ever thought about a Saint Bernard?"
(p. 615)?

Jeremy