VV(13): Enters Weismann

[jbor]

Yes, that middle 'M' is like a 'V' on crutches. But don't forget Mondaugen's
dream of Fasching in Munich -- his own contribution to 'his' Story -- of a
time when he was personally caught up in the decadent siege-mentality of the
proto-Depression which had been caused by the Treaty of Versailles.

And I actually think that Pynchon is playing around with the idea of the
novel's text as a mirror, too, as in the guiding metaphor or rubric for the
traditional 'historical novel' which had been inaugurated by Stendhal in his
_The Red and the Black_ way back in the early c. 19th:

    A novel is a mirror walking upon a main road. Now it reflects to your
    eyes the azure skies, now the mire of the puddles on the road. And the
    man who carries the mirror in his bag you will accuse of being immoral!
    His mirror shows the mire, and you blame the mirror! Blame rather the
    highway where the puddle is, and still more the inspector of roads who
    leaves the water to stagnate and the quagmire to form.
                    Stendhal, _Le Rouge et le Noir ‹ Chronique du XIXe
                    siècle_, Éditions Garnier Frères, Paris, 1973 (1830)
                                                  [p. 342, m.o.p.a.t.]

best

----------
>From: "David Morris" <fqmorris at hotmail.com>
>

> VERA-M-EROV [ing]
>
> It is very loosely close to a palindrome, which does evoke a mirror.  And at
> the center of this is the letter "M,"  which is good since this is
> Mondaugen's Story and consists largely of other people's projections onto
> his consciousness.  Mondaugen IS the mirror.

snip