MDDM Washington & Gershom

[Doug Millison]

jbor:
>So it's pretty likely that the "Even as Clearings ... " speech is from one
>of these "more and more" who have interrupted George and Chas's
>"Tranquillity", as you do note. If this is the case, then it isn't GW, and
>it isn't Mason. I don't think it can be Wicks, as the speaker uses the
>pronouns "we" and "them" to include himself amongst the Americans who are
>being "driven" by the British. So, having narrowed it down in this way,
>let's call this speaker "anonymous colonial revolutionary no. 1", shall we.


OK.  It's good to see you backing away from an argument you seemed to be
offering the other day as final and definitive, re who among the crowd of
people coming into this room speaks these lines of indeterminate
attribution.


jbor:
> For your theory to work the whole exchange, the whole scene
>even, needs to be meaningless.


Hardly.  The dialogue lines contribute their meaning to the scene whether
Pynchon makes it clear who says them or not. Nationalist sentiment is
running high. Racial epithets, too, underscoring the hypocrisy of some of
these men who claim to  love liberty. This is neither the first nor last
smoke-filled room in which privileged white men will plot American politics
that disenfranchise entire classes of people they consider marginal.  I
assume that Pynchon knows what he's doing here and am content to base my
reading on what he presents for us on the page without adding elements he
chose not to add.


jbor:
>And, just what is it that does disrupt Washington's and Mason's
>"Tranquillity"? Is it only the conversation of these other gents, or, as is
>far more likely in my opinion, is it the use of the racist term "Nigger",
>and George's swift and stern rebuke which follows?


Obviously the racist term is part of the disturbance, but it's far from
obvious that Washington delivers the rebuke that your argument so
desperately needs to support the characterization you're trying to create.
The fact that somebody , anybody, objects to the racist term is also enough
to let Pynchon highlight the fact that not everybody liked the way that
some whites talked about African-Americans, his exposure of the gap between
what the Founding Fathers' claimed and what they accomplished stands. But,
if Washington isn't the speaker of the "Civility, Sir!" line as you -- but
not Pynchon -- insist, then where is your textual evidence to support the
absurd contention that W's not racist, that he considers slaves his equals?
It's your interpretation that falls apart, not Pynchon's text.


jbor:
>Well, no, this is inaccurate. Pynchon's text does indicate that Gershom is
>present.
>
>    Others, having caught Gershom's act before, recognize him right away.
>                                                            (573.4)


Not definitively, however.  Pynchon also calls this person "the invisible
Youth" (573).  As one unidentified speaker says, there may be "even more 'n
one" "real Negroe" in here (573). After calling the speaker "the invisible
Youth", and apparently in response to one of the invisible Youth's  jokes,
Mason appears to recognize the voice, saying "Baby-Phiz Nathe McClean, or
I'm a Sailor" and again on p 574 "Nathe once more is subsum'd into Nicotick
Vapors opaque as Futurity."   Pynchon appears to have undercut any
certainty that Gershom is in the smoke-filled room, but it does seem
certain that Nathe is there -- or is it? Murky stuff.


>And one of these other patrons actually calls out to Gersh at 573.6.


And Pynchon leaves open the possibility that this patron might be mistaken,
in atmospheric conditions so hazy that even proud white Virginians might be
taken for African-Americans (" 'twould seem, so are we all" 572).



>I don't think the scene's confusing, or that it's meant to be unclear.


Clearly, we disagree on this point.


>I
>think you find it difficult to acknowledge and accept the bleeding obvious.


Not at all. Maybe it's as you've observed before -- what you sometimes
insist upon with regard to Pynchon's text is not at all obvious, albeit
necessary to support this particularly lame argument you've been trying to
prop up in this ever-lengthening discussion thread.



jbor:
>Well, no, this is inaccurate. George has just described the liberty Gershom
>enjoys as a performer, and the "income *per annum*" which he makes. He
>indicates to Dixon and Mason that he is Gershom's "Master" in name only. The
>description "nominal Master" is George's, his sentiment, his opinion of the
>relationship between he and Gershom. This speech is definitively attributed
>to GW by Pynchon. It discloses George's attitude towards Gershom.


There you go with that Orwellian "slavery is liberty" again!  W's
"attitude" can be just as easily explained the way I explained it:  W the
stoned space cadet demonstrates a disconnect between what he is (slave
owner and master) and what he does (permits intimacies between himself and
a slave that some other slave owners don't), yet the master-slave
relationship remains intact, his privilege sacrosanct. In the earlier
encounter, Pynchon has shown Washington raving about the Jesuit conspiracy,
stoned on pot and buzzed on punch, and so comfortable in his privilege that
he can afford to let Gershom fool around and mock power relationships, as
long, it seems, as he sticks to the king-fool jokes and doesn't tackle
more sharply defined master-slave subject matter (but it seems Gershom
turns the tables after all, see below). Pynchon's W is a strange character,
probably been out on the farm too long smoking that loco weed, time for him
to get busy again, come out of semi-retirement, get involved in the
revolution -- Pynchon sticks reasonably close to the general outline of the
historical Washington in such scenario, too (although we don't know for
sure if W smoked pot).


There's no need for me to back away from what I said in my earlier post:

>>Everything that's said and done in the scene can also be explained by a
>>relationship that permits  intimacies between two parties who otherwise
>>remain unequal, such as the master-slave relationships that produced
>>bastard children (what the Vrooms try to force Austra to do with Mason
>>earlier in the novel, for example, or would you also argue that they treat
>>her as an "equal"?) that then became the property (and profit source) of
>>the master.  Pynchon shows the Washington household in this instance as a
>>casual place, certainly, where master and slave party together -- but that
>>doesn't change the fact that they remain fixed in their roles as master and
>>slave.


jbor:
> you
>jumped all over that post, within a few minutes.


I note that you haven't let much grass grow before your own replies in this
thread. Shall I count the hours until your reply?


 jbor:
>Just reflecting further on this, there's a pretty strong match-up between
>the narrator's description of how "their Tranquillity is not long preserv'd"
>(572.11) and the metaphor of the "Shark" invading "this quiet Pool of
>Reason", from the admonitory speech at 572.26 which is (very probably)
>attributable to GW.


It's not at all certain that Washington speaks this line, of course, as I
believe we've now made clear.  But, I agree that Pynchon has used the
appropriate metaphor to foreshadow the way that racism threatens the future
Tranquility of the US, and he's created a Washington who seems blissfully
unaware of the deeply ingrained racism that shapes his behavior.

By the way, that joke on p. 573, with the punch line "I'll go at Night" --
I've heard it told in Lousiana, in the early '60s, in a different way.  The
butt of the joke is an African-Americain astronaut who blithely volunteers
to fly a spaceship to the sun, and offers this as the saving strategy.