Weissmann/Blicero

[Terrance]

> 
> No questions remain in my mind except those I've posed of you, and which you
> haven't seen fit to address.

If they are questions about me and your accusations of
bigotry, I'm sorry, I don't want to  discuss it with you. 

> 
> *******
> >
> >>  The second line  of the song clinches it, I think, and is a
> >> statement of their humanity which  Blicero's "specter" has
> >> given them a model for, and the strength to assert:
> >>
> >>       If *I'm* a degenerate, *so* are *you*. . . .
> >>
> >>  This is pretty close to Pynchon's sentiment on the issue, I
> >> would imagine.
> >
> > Yes, I would imagine, but back to the text now.
> 
> Pardon me? The line from the song is in the text. You seem unwilling to
> engage with the opening and closing paragraphs of the 175 camp sequence at
> all. Why not?

Oh yes I will, and I'll discuss this song, they are in the
book, the entire chapter or episode is of interest to me and
I will discussion any word in it. Although I still contend
that you continue to twist my words and the language of the
text. 


> 
> > "WHo else COULD the 175s have
> > chosen..." Sounds like they didn't have a chose, doesn't it,
> 
> No, it sounds like a rhetorical question to me.

OK, a rhetorical question implying what? 


> 
> > and besides they "choose" him "for their very highest
> > oppressor." Oppressor?
> 
> oppress vb ... 3. to lie heavy on (the mind, imagination, etc.) ...
>                                               [Collins]

The context does not support this connotation.  Tell me to
fuck off again, it's OK, 
but this is lame obfuscation. 

> 
> > How can he be a model of their
> > humanity and their "chosen" highest oppressor?
> 
> A benevolent despot, perhaps? A father-god?

A father Imago,  perhaps? Yes, I think I posted several long
posts on Blicero and Father Imago, I'll dig them up. 

> 
> > Also, "HIS
> > POWER IS ABSOLUTE." What does that mean?
> 
> Like a god's. Yes, a gods. 


> 
> But you are still misinterpreting, if not misrepresenting, the passage, and
> the sequence within which it is enclosed, imo. 

OK, we can discuss this. 



It is not Blicero but
> Blicero's **name** which is pervading this post-war autumn. 

Right, "The name has found its way this far east GR.666. 



Blicero isn't
> there in the 175s camp at all. 

Right. 


Furthermore, these men never even saw Blicero
> while they were in Dora, let alone experienced or even really knew what sort
> of management style he maintained in the Mittelwerke. 

True. 


It is the *mystique*
> of Blicero, this openly homosexual Nazi Major whom the SS guards at Dora
> were so in awe of, which they have idolised:
> 
>      "We think he's out there," the town spokesman is telling Thanatz,
>      alive and on the run. Now and then we hear something -- it could fit
>      Blicero easily enough. So we wait. He will find us. He has a
>      prefabricated power base here, waiting for him." (667.9)

My argument is that they have taken him as their oppressor
in "liberated" banishment  not simply because of what they
hear from the SS guards, he was  openly homosexual, but
because "Weissmann/Blicero's presence crossed the wall,
warping, shivering into the fetid bunkrooms, with the same
reach toward another shape as words trying to make their way
through dreams." GR.666




> 
> >  Blicero may
> > be venerated by the characters that have been infected by
> > his power and absolute domination and charisma
> 
> A question for you, then. In respect to those characters who do venerate
> Blicero -- Enzian, Katje, Gottfried, the 175s -- what is the source of
> Blicero's power and charisma? As far as I can see in each and every instance
> these characters have chosen freely to love, respect, honour, and/or revere
> this man.

OK, we are back to the book. I hope we can discuss it, I am
learning and it's interesting, we have such radically
opposed readings of a major character, but 
if we can stop the name calling it would be more productive,
right?