TGI Friday somewhere

Fri Jun 15 08:36:20 CDT 2001

http://www.hyperarts.com/pynchon/v/stravinsky.html

>From David Cowart's Thomas Pynchon: The Art of Illusion :

Pynchon
    systematically alters even the minor details: the fictional riot takes 
place
    at the end of July, rather than May, 1913, and in the Théâtre Vincent
    Castor, instead of the Théâtre des Champs Elysèes." (pp.74-75)

Is Cowart correct? Does the fictional riot, the performance take place at 
the end of July?
By my calendars it would take place in early August.
Turn back to the end of the previous chapter where Benny and Stencil enter 
Central Park in NYC
very early in the morning.  A bum says it is Tuesday. The narrator says it 
is Saturday. It is Saturday. That is if we are on the same calendar as the 
narrator here. However, the author introduces ambiguities. Why? Because he 
is working with a few calendars at once. There is, and we know how important 
this is and how very complex in M&D and GR, a four day discrepancy here 
between the bum's calendar and the narrator's NY Times calendar. Not 
important? Turn to Grant's Companion (BTW, Doug asked if one of our old 
Pynchers is around. Might want to read what he has to say about 
Weisneburger's Companion and Time and Si-Fi) page 192, Winter, Grant says, 
"The confusion is surely the result of an oversight on Pynchon's part…" and 
every time I read this from a critic, I suspect that the critic is surely in 
error. Not that Mr. TRP doesn't make mistakes, but more often he bends time, 
dates, allusions (the Yew tree, see Eddins and Weisenburger) to fit and Now  
Stencil says it is 1913. It is, as he's the narrator, his or rather V's  
Baedeker Catholicism materializes on 24 July, 1913, a Thursday.  So, there 
is only a week to rehearse if the performance is, as Cowart says, in the end 
of July. But we know that they rehearse for about two weeks. Therefore, it 
seems that the performance is in August. Could it be August the 6th. That's 
a fixed day on the calendar. The calendar is lunar (Jewish like Rachel and 
half of Benny-his Mother-and changes in the night when the Jews wander, but 
also solar (Roman, like half of Benny-his Father is an Italian Roman 
Catholic-so that certain days, like the transfiguration, are fixed. Did 
someone mention that James I? I though so, but Stencil is quite a historian. 
On what day was the Bad priest dissembled?  In any event,

http://www.britannica.com/seo/j/joachim-of-fiore/

Oh, leading up to this August 6th, on another calendar, or two or three, 
depending on how catholic,
we read Luke. Luke and Paul, both are important to Malta. Maybe Luke 19-22.

Thy enemies will dig a drench around thee and  shall compass thee round…

and

http://www.britannica.com/seo/s/saint-margaret-of-antioch/

Your ungrateful hypocrit,
M

PS sorry for running through the kitchen with these
muddy shoes and dripping on the rug, Ma, but you know
kids today, they can't go to a party w/o starting a fight.

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