MDDM Ch. 72 Dixon's act of violence

[jbor]

      Dixon, moving directly, seizes the Whip,-- the owner comes after
    it,-- Dixon places his Fist in the way of the oncoming Face, the Driver
    cries out and stumbles away. Dixon follows, raising the Whip. "Turn
    around. I'll guess *you've* never felt this."
      "You broke my Tooth!" (698.32-36)

on 13/3/02 12:44 PM, Doug Millison at millison at online-journalist.com wrote:

> The sense is passive, of course, despite my misstatement -- I place
> something there and it stays there --  the "oncoming Face" is moving, in
> Pynchon's text if not yours.

Who said the "oncoming Face" *isn't* moving?

Anyway, Dixon "places his Fist in the way of the oncoming Face". To do this
he must make a fist with his hand, then raise and extend his arm so that the
fist is in line with the slave-driver's head. This action occurs after he
sees the slave-driver coming towards him. Dixon's hand and arm *do* move.

It's perhaps a defensive gesture on Dixon's part, maybe even a reflex,
though it's certainly not a passive one. And his next actions - "Dixon
follows, raising the Whip" - are absolutely aggressive.

> jbor reverses what Pynchon wrote, in jbor's phrase "a punch lands
> forcefully in the slave-driver's face"  when Pynchon is unambiguous in
> writing that the motion belongs to the slave driver, "the oncoming  Face"
> crashing into Dixon's fist.  jbor thus changes Pynchon's phrase, and builds
> an interpretation on the rewrite.  When jbor say Dixon "places his fist
> deliberately, and obviously with force" jbor takes the rewrite a step
> further.  Pynchon writes nothing in this passage about Dixon's placement of
> the fist being  "with force," that's jbor's addition pure and simple.

Of course it is forceful. After the punch "the Driver cries out and stumbles
away." (698.33) Then he exclaims, "You broke my Tooth!" (698.36)

Meanwhile Dixon begins (in all likelihood - as per what he says, the vocal
emphases in his dialogue, the fact that the guy ends up on the ground
"cring[ing]" in the mud) to assault the slave-driver with his own whip.

Dixon deliberately "places" his fist - not a piano or a dinner plate - in
such a way that a forceful punch lands, deliberately, in the slave-driver's
face. He then sets about beating the man with the whip.
    
Clear as crystal. No reverses or rewrites necessary.

best