ch. 67, "Life as Fiction"

[Bandwraith at aol.com]

And may we assume a certain amount of self-interest in
this meditation of Wicks?

    "...yet for as long as its Distance from the Post Mark'd
    West remains unmeasur'd, nor is yet unrecorded as
    Fact, may it remain a-shimmer, among the few final
    Pages of its Life as Fiction." {650]

Notwithstanding the usual pomo whim wham, just his cozy
parlor perch amongst pastries, coffee and brandy would
seem to be informing these gusts. [But rest easy, Wicks.
For sure, your reality seems more substantial than, say, 
The War Powers Act, in these, our own less than certain
times. But alas, the dangers of American hegemony are
no fiction.]

And yet, isn't there a common thread regarding this idea
of uncertainty? The RS response to M&D's carefully thought
out letter:

    '...Whenever their circumstances, now uncertain and
    eventual, shall happen to be reduced to Certainty.'[45]

gave them both pause for repeated reflection. Then there is
the opening of ch. 53, from the Undeliver'd Sermons, and:

    "...The final pure Christ is pure uncertainty." [511]

As if it all were a bit of white noise. It seems to me, that Wicks,
at least, is sending out feelers- allowing that the end of his own
tale (and comfort) may be approaching, as well as, trying to gauge
just how far off that future interdiction might be. Christ,
then, for Wicks, might be some expansion of the present Visto 
into the mists of indefiniteness, i.e., Death as Fiction.

The next five chapters capture the end of M&D as a working
partnership.