MDDM Ch. 72 Dixon and the slave driver (Italics)

[Otto]

italics -- often in the plural; as, the Italics are the author's. Italic
letters are used to distinguish words for emphasis, importance, antithesis,
etc

But you cannot focus on the eight times italicised "you" only, Terrance. The
whole text from 696.7 on prepares the reader for what is to come, a reversal
of the S&M-roles, if only for short. But the italics indicate that he whips
indeed.

According to the given text Dixon only manages his (clearly expressed)
desire to kill the driver. There's nothing said of a desire to whip the man.
He just whips, "works" on the man as he himself calls it, and any other
reading is an obvious misreading of the text, given the historical record
where Pynchon took the story from: "righteous wrath overcame his Quaker
principles" -- indeed, and Pynchon uses this historical event and his own
imagination to make a story of it!

I agree to you that he doesn't necessarily hit the driver every time he
shakes the whip, even the more experienced slave-driver only is "Mostly
encountering the air" (698.18) in his rage so it seems kind of unlikely to
me that Dixon, being inexperienced in this kind of business, in his
"righteous wrath" should be much more successful. But Dixon clearly wants to
show the driver what he's doing to others, what his daily "work" is about.

Otto

----- Original Message -----
From: "Terrance" <lycidas2 at earthlink.net>
To: "s~Z" <keithsz at concentric.net>
Cc: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Sunday, August 25, 2002 7:14 PM
Subject: Re: MDDM Ch. 72 Dixon and the slave driver (Italics)
>
>
> s~Z wrote:
> >
> > >>>The example of the Driver doesn't count.<<<
> >
> > It is the only one that counts.
>
Terrance wrote:
> I guess you're right, because even if the driver's italics indicate that
> each emphasized word (i.e., "fuck'd", "plus") is accoompanied by a lash
> of the whip --a reasonable assumption--most of these lashes do not
> strike a person (hate versus capital--perishable labor) but are directed
> at the air and fail to inflict much injury.  Likewise, even if all of
> Dixon's italics indicate that he is shaking the whip or even lashing,
> there is nothing in the text to suggest that Dixon is not simply shaking
> the whip in the air, failing to inflict injury on the Driver.
>
> But, if we can find other examples where P uses italics in this way it
> might help. It might not. What if these are the only two examples from
> any P text?

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