SLSL "A Small Rain"

[Paul Mackin]

jbor wrote:

>It's more the way that his name is constructed that I was getting at,
>although "Pig" does have his moments in the novels as well, and there's
>similarly a sense that Levine has squandered his education and doesn't
>really possess the capacity or desire for self-reflection, as you point out.
>(In fact it's his Jewishness which seems to provide the impetus for his -
>potential or partial, at least - reinvigoration. Cf. the paragraph at 48-49)
>Levine is the prototypical Pynchonian schlemihl character I think, from whom
>both Benny Profane and Tyrone Slothrop eventually derive.
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>best
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Thinking of p's various service-man characters as personality types, it 
is oddly difficult to think of Lardass in terms comparable to the way we 
might classify Profane as a schlemiel (stated in the text) or Bodine as 
a zhlub.  Can anyone suggest something useful here, not necessary a 
Yiddish word?  Slothrop isn't exactly a type either but we do feel the 
strong presence forces working on in not outright controlling him-- some 
kind of guardian angel protecting him from harm, at least up to a 
certain point.

On the Lardass/Bodine comparison (aside from their naming) they seem to 
me totally unalike. Lardass may be squandering his education but Bodine 
almost surely has no education to squander. Bodine is a crude sexual 
agressor, Nathan waits for the partner to act.
Slothrop and Benny have a touch of Nathan in this respect. Fairly 
irresistible.

 Unfortunately my knowledge of Pynchon text is a little stale, something 
I should rectify if I've going to partipate usefully here.

Anyway,  think I see the points you are making.

P.


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>on 30/11/02 6:50 PM, Paul Mackin at paul.mackin at verizon.net wrote:
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>>I might see some of the similarties Rob did but do find problems as
>>well. Pig sure never went to  CCNY. Hard to think Lardass did. I knew
>>more than one Pig in the course of my "navy career" and have also known
>>CCNY grads.  Never met a Lardass,  Not conclusive I know but to go on
>>Pynchon was making use of what he had, which was a knowledge of barracks
>>(same as shipboard) life including how enlisted men and lower rank
>>officers talk, plus the literary lore that goes with being an English
>>major.  How to economically fuse these two strengths into a short piece
>>of fiction. Lardass was the answer even if (in my opinion) quite a
>>synthetic one. I'm sure Pynchon already knew enough this early in his
>>young life  to include a Bodine (Pig is a common type in the military)
>>but a Pig would not have economically and conveniently fit. It's just
>>too bad that there was no Baedeker for small southern state colleges and
>>their coeds. I'm not knocking the story.  As I say he worked with what
>>he had.
>>
>>P.
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