re Re: MDDM Washington & Gershom

[Doug Millison]

jbor :
>Nothing else Gersh does or says in either scene "fulfils GW's expectations",
>either explicit or implicit.


The scene Pynchon writes shows the exact opposite.  W asks for punch, pipe,
etc., Gershom does what he's asked -- that's what the text shows,
illlustrating, clearly,  that Gershom does what he's asked to do without
painful threats or physical punishment.


> Again, you're making up this
>condition of behaviour to suit your preconceived argument.


No, using your phrase again, that's what Pynchon's text illustrates.
Washington's actions shows that he trusts Gershom to travel and return,
that he lets Gershom practice a special skill, that Gershom does what he's
expected to do.  Pynchon's text doesn't explain why Washington acts as he
does.  You say (but Pynchon doesn't) it is because W grants G "absolute
liberty", an absurd proposition given that Washington remains Gershom's
legal owner and master (the text makes that clear).  I say it's because G
is well-trained, knows exactly what he can and can't get away with as W's
slave -- Pynchon doesn't say that, either, but my reading explains the
situation as well as yours does, you don't have a final and definitive
answer, you're creating an interpretation, jumping to conclusions, and
propping it up with bits and pieces of text, no less and no more than I do.
You don't have the unique key to unlock the unique meaning of this part of
the book.


>Again, you're so intent on burying GW
>in a "revisionist" mudslide that you totally ignore Gersh's pov, his words
>and actions, let alone the characterisations and relationships in the novel.


That's a wild exaggeration that ignores the way I've actually read this
scene in the context of the rest of the novel!  I'm reading  the scene from
Gershom's point of view, with the knowledge provided by the author that
Gershom is Washington's slave, sticking closely to what Pynchon actually
writes.


>Gershom asks Mason and Dixon for investment advice at the bottom of p. 279.


 The novel shows the men  all stoned on pot and punch, with Washington and
Gershom acting out a two-person shtick that Pynchon describes as "an
elaborate Folly of Courtly Love".  In this situation it's difficult to tell
who's being serious about what comments, what's been prearranged between
master and slave or not, the reader walks in and the play begins.  Dixon's
reaction to Gershom's exaggerated "confidence"   -- they "make eye contact,
Dixon blurting, "Didn't they tell us,--" (279)  would seem to indicate he
and Mason have been warned against some sort of con, probably they've heard
talk about the Great Dismal Swamp Land Company boondoggle which has been a
pipe dream in this part of the country for years, they've been warned that
W might tap them for an investment.



>You haven't provided even one example from the novel that shows GW denying
>Gershom the liberty


The novel is clear on the fact that Gershom is W's slave.  M&D shows
Gershom enjoying certain privileges, but as the novel also shows, slaves in
Virginia do only what their owners let them do, they can just as easily
find themselves chained up, on the auction block, punished with a whip --
Pynchon draws a rather detailed picture of this in the novel.  You keep
calling Gershom's condition "liberty" but liberty doesn't co-exist with the
condition of being a slave.


>That's because Pynchon's GW
>actually allows Gersh absolute liberty to speak and act as he pleases.


You're jumping to a conclusion that the text just doesn't support, because
you can't give up this oxymoronic notion that Gershom's slavery is actually
"absolute liberty", an absurd notion that  is unnecessary to follow the
scene that Pynchon depicts, and which Pynchon says nothing about.



[Just googling around for references to liberty and slavery:

http://rpuchalsky.home.att.net/libfaq.html
Do the Libertarians really believe that slavery should be legal?

Some do, you bet! Many Libertarians of the anarcho-capitalist variety
believe that you can't really own something unless you can sell it.
Therefore, since you own yourself you can sell yourself. They have no
problems with selling yourself into slavery as long as it is "voluntary"
(i.e. as long as you are starving and see no other way to get food, for
instance.) Some Libs will indignantly claim that they don't believe in
slavery. Usenet
threads on the subject generally reveal that at least 1/3 of Libertarians
support slavery and think that it should be legal for one human being to
own another. ]



>Ch. 28 certainly shows GW treating and regarding Gersh as an equal.


Washington doesn't treat Gershom as an equal, he expects him to serve, just
as he expects his wife to serve -- Washington is a patriarchal, slave-owner
in action, letting his hair down (literally, W removes his wig at one point
in this chapter) partying with the slaves, that's what Pynchon shows,
reminiscent of the kind of 60s' character who talks revolution and smokes
pot, while enjoying the privileges of an unjust social system (slavery) and
who expects women to prepare sweets for the men to eat while they talk
politics, as Martha correctly observes.


>When does it end?


If you're tired of the game, stop playing.