Them Badasses (was Re: Blicero's sexuality

[David Morris]

>>From: Eric Rosenbloom <ericr at sadlier.com>
>>Yes, except that, like Pointsman, he serves the System as well as himself. 
>>The Badass is a folk hero, like John Dillinger
>
>From: "jbor" Well, yes and no. As well as Ned Ludd, Pynchon exemplifies the 
>Badass in Frankenstein's monster, Alfonso the Good from Walpole's _The 
>Castle of Otranto_, and King Kong. It's not so much a question of serving 
>"the System" as having been created by it (literally and/or 
>metaphorically), and then, monstrous, turning upon whatever or whomever 
>created them in order to wreak total annihilation. Blicero would certainly 
>fit that bill to an extent, as also perhaps would Dillinger.

Jbor has a point here.  The Badass is, besides folk hero, also the monster: 
King Kong & Frankenstein, the unexpected and uncontrolable result of the 
workings of the System.  Blicero can be seen as the product of their System, 
but in a very different way than King Kong or Franky.  He embraces the Death 
System, but that does not make him bad.

Others in Pynchon's novels embrace their oppressors, and become monsters.  
Think of slave woman at the Cape in MD, or the  Jesuit-abducted  S&M 
Sisterhood, of Frenesi.  Such an embrace is the result, I think, of an 
acceptance of things as they are, and a decision to turn the tables of a 
sort by _choosing_ victimization.  The Zone-Herero are another example, of a 
sort.  These are not all the same, but they are variations with distinct 
commonality.

David Morris
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