SLSL "TSR" "your last summary"

[pynchonoid]

"It's only been a couple of weeks since your last
summary, hasn't it," the clerk said. (29)

Dugan may refer to "summary court-martial", part of
the US military justice system.

http://www.constitution.org/mil/ucmj19970615.htm
820 ART. 20. JURISDICTION OF SUMMARY COURTS-MARTIAL
Subject to section 817 of this title (article 17),
summary courts-martial have jurisdiction to try
persons subject to this chapter, except officers,
cadets, aviation cadets, and midshipman, for any
noncapital offense made punishable by this chapter. No
person with respect to whom summary courts-martial
have jurisdiction may be brought to trial before a
summary court-martial if he objects thereto. If
objection to trial by summary court-martial is made by
an accused, trial may be ordered by special or general
court-martial as may be appropriate. Summary
courts-martial may, under such limitations as the
President may prescribe, adjudge any punishment not
forbidden by this chapter except death, dismissal,
dishonorable or bad-conduct discharge, confinement for
more than one month, hard labor without confinement
for more than 45 days, restrictions to specified
limits for more than two months, or forfeiture of more
than two-thirds of one month's pay. [...] 

824. ART. 24. WHO MAY CONVENE SUMMARY COURTS-MARTIAL
(a) Summary courts-martial may be convened by--

(1) any person who may convene a general or special
court-martial; 

(2) the commanding officer of a detached company other
detachment of the Army;

(3) the commanding officer of a detached squadron or
other detachment of the Air Force; or

(4) the commanding officer or officer in charge of any
other command when empowered by the Secretary
concerned.

(b) When only one commissioned officer is present with
a command or detachment he shall be the summary
court-martial of that command or detachment and shall
hear and determine all summary court-martial cases
brought before him. Summary courts-martial may,
however, be convened in any case by superior competent
authority when considered desirable by him. [...] 


  

"Don't tell me they're going to put me in jail. Not
again." (29)

Buried beneath Levine's sloth and fat may lurk an 
anger management problem; he drinks a bit and he seems
prone to brawling (judging from the scene later in the
story when Nathan knocks out Picnic with a "wild
roundhouse").

I don't find Levine a very attractive character, all
things considered, but understandable.  He's "inert"
on first view, he loves military life and seems
attracted to it as a career (US Army joke:  Why are
lifers like maggots?  Because they eat shit and bother
people),  he's numb to the death (and life, Buttercup
for example) that surrounds him, he seems to sense
that some change is possible for him, that he might be
able to move out of his situation (where he seems as
trapped and lost as that "cockroach following some
private maze across the floor"), then he falls asleep
at the end of the story. The connection to Benny
Profane having learned nothing by the end of V. seems
apt.  Trapped in a System of which he is barely aware
and against which struggle is futile -- again, in his
first published story, Pynchon launches a theme to
which he will return again and again....

-Doug








=====
<http://www.pynchonoid.blogspot.com/>

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com