COL49: lots of lots

[jbor]

The other word that jumps out from the book's title, and which perhaps
doesn't get as much attention as the multiple and ultimately indeterminate
numerological significations of that "49", is "crying". The auctioneer
"crying" the item to be auctioned is the literal meaning, but there is also
an ambiguity in the way that this idiomatic phrase is structured which makes
it sound as if the inanimate object (the "lot") is doing the "crying". The
word carries with it connotations of weeping (across any emotion, ranging
from sadness and distress to nostalgia to total euphoria -- thinking of
Oedipa's bubble shades here too) as well as calling out, and both of these
relate to the way the whole mystery calls out to Oedipa, its revelatory
force and persistence, and the soul-searching and self-doubt and depths of
despair into which she is ultimately plunged. There are quite a few examples
of personification of the inanimate in the novel, and it's an important
theme throughout Pynchon's work, and I suspect it is one reason why he was
attracted to this phrase for his title.

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