V. (Ch 3)

[Lorentzen / Nicklaus]

 don't know if this has already been mentioned, but looking up the name lepsius 
 in the lexikon (- brockhaus 1982, own translation) i found the following:

 "lepsius, karl richard (12/23/1810 - 7/10/1884), egyptologist and one of the  
 first africanists, guided the prussian expedition, that did between 1843-46   
 research in the nile valley up to sudan, founded the egyptian museum in berlin. 
 important for african studies is his invention of an alphabet for oral 
 languages and a structuring [gliederung] of africa's nations and languages."

kfl


jbor schrieb:
>
> ----------
> >
>
> > Goodfellow has that affuent look--but underneath? Goodfellow and Lepsius
> > seem to share the theorem that in Egypt, one can be uncivilized and
> > perpetrate fighting for gain.
>
> The exchange between Lepsius and Goodfellow (75.13) at the Fink Restaurant
> after the party at the Austrian Consulate delineates (for Max R-B at least,
> and so for the reader) "how the sides were drawn up". Lepsius refers to
> "this soiled South", while Goodfellow comments that "far enough down the
> Nile one gets back to a kind of primitive spotlessness"; Lepsius counters
> that there "are no property rights down there", while Goodfellow demurs that
> Europeans are "civilized" and thus "jungle law is inadmissable." Each man
> presumes to speak on behalf of a different colonial faction; but for both of
> them Africa is merely an abstraction, land to be claimed in the name of one
> or another European imperial power.
>
> What is interesting is that the European alliances are never really
> clarified, are perhaps still forming in fact. At the Consulate party Yusef
> the factotum speculates that the looming trouble in Upper Egypt is between
> England and France, with "Germany (and therefore Italy and Austria)" aligned
> in a "temporary rapprochement" with the former, and Russia in league with
> the latter (67.3). However, he notices the Austrian Consul "spending much
> time in the company of his Russian conterpart" (68.9). Similarly, Lepsius
> (who is Hanne's "lover") is German, while Goodfellow and Porpy, who are
> obviously Lepsius's opponents, are unmistakeably British. Bongo-S seems to
> be a rather heartless (perhaps literally!) mercenary who is working for
> Lepsius.
>
> The reader will never really find out where Victoria fits in (I suspect she
> is just a "green girl" at this point 72.26, who thinks herself "in love"
> with Goodfellow and who is asking Porpy to protect his partner, which Porpy
> does because he is perhaps "in love" with Victoria too 93.8 -- it really is
> some tragic grand opera!), let alone who is working for which government.
> This is because from the point of view of the locals who narrate the
> episodes they are all the same, interchangeable (Gebrail: "How could you say
> they were people: they were money." 84.15). Pynchon overturns the historical
> paradigm by changing the perspective of narration. Stencil aspires to
> represent an objective vantage (it is significant to note that Stencil's
> final "impersonation" is of a camera lens); he conceives the locals as
> insignificant, and as impartial witnesses to the political intrigues of the
> Europeans. However, what seeps through the impersonations is quite a
> different lesson, one which Stencil possibly misses: these locals are people
> as well. As Waldetar quips:
>
>      There's no organized effort about it but there remains a grand joke
>      on all visitors to Baedeker's world: the permanent residents are
>      actually humans in disguise. (78.18)
>
> best
>