MDDM "Another Slave-Colony"

[jbor]

Scott:

> While I don't really disagree, for me at least, all of Pynchon's works
> exhibit a strong interest in the formation of America - the paths taken, the
> paths that might have been taken - politically, socially, culturally...and
> maybe the "might have beens", at least, are more apparent from an "exterior"
> vantage.

Yes, I'd agree with this. And, I've often had the impression that Pynchon
writes (and behaves) as if he, too, were in fact an "outsider". Or perhaps
has attempted to, at least.
 
>> I think that the despairing words spoken by both Mason and Dixon here, at
>> the end of the first section - "Another Slave-Colony...so have I heard as
>> well. Christ." -  really bring it home to American readers who might have
>> laughed at and scorned the Vrooms and the Dutch slave-colony at the Cape.
> 
> This seems a bit unfair. While we may have a ways to go yet in rectifying
> this and other wrongs, I don't think that the history of American slavery is
> in any way "swept under the rug". Some reflection on our own past is
> inevitable for any American reader of the Cape sections.

I'm not sure, though the generalisation is perhaps unfair to many Americans,
particularly those who are long-time readers of Pynchon. I think the
historical, geographical and cultural specificities in the Cape chapters
work against any cross-referencing to the history of American slavery - that
was the reading experience even for me - until the comments in Ch. 25. I
think Mason's glib rejoinder here is very confronting for the reader.

In his work, and particularly in 'TSI', 'Watts' and _GR_, it's those
vestiges of slavery which outlasted the American Civil War, by a century at
least, which Pynchon does reveal as being "swept under the rug" I think.

best