Pynchon & rap

[jbor]

on 7/12/01 4:06 AM, Terrance at lycidas2 at earthlink.net wrote:

> PS I think the rap debate can be resolved very easily. All
> we need to do is type up the pages from M&D and get them up
> on the board. A close examination of the text will resolve
> this one too, I'm sure.

I think most who are actually interested in discussing Pynchon's work have
access to the text, so it's probably not worth the trouble of typing it all
out. But I would be interested to hear your take on the various references
to Plato throughout the scene. First, there's Ethelmer's reference to the
*Republic* at the top of 262, and then Wicks' correction re. the
dithyrambists.

dithyramb n. Greek choric hymn, wild in character; Bacchanalian song;
passionate or inflated poem, speech, or writing

"Dithyrambic is an adjective which may be applied to any form of rather
'wild' song or chant."

The example given from modern literature is Dryden's 'Alexander's Feast':

http://www.andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Texts/alexander.html

It certainly alludes to that university drinking song which will become the
American anthem, but is that it? (Is rap somewhat dithyrambic I wonder.)

The second reference at 264.14 is to "the Modal change Plato fear'd", or
else "one he did not foresee". At first I interpreted this to mean a change
in modality (i.e. "Modal" in the linguistic sense): something like a gradual
shift from certainty to uncertainty (vis a vis history, morality, justice
etc). But "Modal change" could just as easily refer to a change in
literary/aesthetic genre, such as that "revolution" those dithyrambists were
no doubt bringing about (cf. that shift from the Apollonian to the Dionysian
which Nietzsche puts such an emphasis on in _The Birth of Tragedy_ perhaps?)
Or else could it allude to the shift from the oral mode to the written which
Plato was so dead set against in general?

I agree with you when you say that it's important to take into account the
various character(isation)s when discussing the points of view they invoke,
but I honestly think it's going to be a hell of a job uncovering a single
"implied author" in the midst of it all. I mean, I know which of the
characters I like, but ...

Also, who's Euphrenia's "sister"? (261.3 up)

best