Pynchon or jbor? Which do you want it to be? WAS Re: more re MDDM Dixon's act of violence

[Doug Millison]

Speculate as you will about what Pynchon leaves out of his text, but he
certainly does not show Dixon whipping the slave driver.

After slamming into Dixon and falling to the ground, the slave driver has
every reason to cringe, Dixon's standing over him, holding his whip,
threatening to whip or kill him.  Maybe Mason is now standing over the
driver, too, threatening the driver as well -- but we don't know that,
because if it happened, Pynchon chose not to write about it in the text
before us, it's pure speculation. Since Pynchon does not write anything
about Dixon whipping the driver , the slave driver's change in attitude,
from sniveling to arrogant,  is more easily attributed to his realization
that Dixon is not going to whip him.  Time passes, Dixon talks instead of
using the whip, he realizes that Dixon is no going to follow through on his
threat.

Interesting though your reading may be, it's not Pynchon -- you can
suppport your argument that Dixon whips the slave driver only by adding to
the text elements that Pynchon has not written.

Once you decide to start adding to the text, you can make Pynchon say
whatever you want to say -- but it's pure speculation on your part, you've
left the actual text behind in the dust.



jbor:
 I think it's easy
to tell from the slave-driver's responses what's happening in the encounter,
and that this is Pynchon's way of conveying to the reader the action in this
scene. When it's just Dixon's words (at 698.27 and 699.20) the
slave-driver's not afraid at all, he's downright arrogant and superior. But
there's a total change in between. He goes from surprise and disbelief ("You
broke my Tooth!") to being a snivelling coward cowering in the mud. Stern
words alone could not have provoked such a turnaround in the man's emotions
and demeanour. When Dixon begins assaulting him he's totally shocked and
sincerely fears for his life. And, there's no other reason for him to be
"cringing there among the Waggon-Ruts", no way for him to have ended up on
the ground, if all Dixon was doing was making verbal threats. I think that
once the attack has stopped and the slave-driver recognises Dixon's sudden
change of heart at 699.20 he's back to his snide and unrepentant self again.
It's the changes in the way the slave-driver is responding which reveal
what's going on in the scene.

Note also that Dixon has "his Hat back" when he first confronts the
slave-driver. (698.28) I suspect he's dressed in Quaker garb (cf. "Don't bet
the Meeting House on that" at 699.24 and "Go back to Philadelphia" at
699.26), and that the initial complacence and then sudden shock which the
slave-driver experiences and expresses are caused by the almost incredible
fact that he is being assaulted in the street by a Quaker.

best