Don't let that evening sun go down

[Doug Millison]

I don't know what Terrance and jbor are complaining about, re the current
discussion, it hasn't been this lively in weeks, and the only people
slinging obscenities have been Terrance and "Morris", but that's the usual
state of affairs, we have all heard worse.  (And of course I had nothing to
do with that unfortunate digression that Terrance  and MalignD entertained
the rest of us with for several days.) Everybody else (besides Terrance, I
mean) seems to be maintaning pretty well, disagreeing but keeping it civil,
and I think I may have even heard a genial laugh or two out there, and
spied a wry grin now and again.

Meanwhile, I have written some posts regarding the current chapters in the
MDMD sequence, if anybody would care to read and respond to them:
http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0203&msg=65704&sort=date (MDMD:
411.20 "that timeless _Encyclopedia-Light_" )
http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0203&msg=65702&sort=date (MDMD
Ch. 40 Presque Isle )

Or, Terrance (and anybody else not happy with the current discussion) can
always introduce some new discussion threads and see if they draw any
interest.

Terrance:
"Doug is kicking Jbor's butt this time around [...] because Jbor
(uncharacteristically I might add) is not
sticking to the text."

Thanks for noticing.

I invite comment on my later posts in this thread, re Pynchon's
reconciliation of opposites
(http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0203&msg=65734&sort=date) ,
and Cherrycoke's (and Pynchon's) possible motives for rewriting Dixon's
history
(http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0203&msg=65743&sort=date).  As
I said, the back-and-forth between jbor and me on this topic would seem to
bethe sort of thing Pynchon is addressing in this Ch. 72 episode, and he
seems also to show a way to reconcile such duality.

Back to the current chapters and why I thought it not completely
inappropriate to look forward to Dixon's encounter with the Slave-Driver
and his Whip:

Mason's use of his Whip on p. 408 might be seen to foreshadow that
instrument's effectiveness as a weapon, and therefore underscore how
Dixon's refusal to use it as a weapon, in the Ch. 72 encounter, might be an
acknowledgement of his Quaker pacifist roots, by Cherrycoke for his own
purposes in spinning the yarn, or by Pynchon for thus letting Cherrycoke
twist the historical record.

Dixon's profession of his Quaker pacifism at p. 397, "Did they tell You I
was a Quaker, Sir, and would not fight?" also seems to point ahead to Ch.
72 and the Slave-Driver encounter that so many readers and critics have
pointed to as a sort of climax in the book, a key passage, a very important
point in the arc of Dixon's character development.  Dixon's apparent
inability to "see" the slaves on this trip to Virginia is also dramatically
reversed 300 pages later, as I noted earlier.

Sorry, Terrance, but when I subscribed to Pynchon-L nobody made me promise
to follow your rules for discussion, this is not your classroom.

jbor:
"But we're getting along fine with the MDDM, thanks
very much"

Pynchon-L isn't your private club, either.

jbor:
"as you
attempt to elevate the pitch of this debate."

If you'll read my posts -- especially the recent one where I illustrated
Pynchon's reconciliation of duality in a higher unity with our present
disagreement and concluded, "Everybody wins" -- I think you might agree
I've been working overtime to keep it civil.  And, if it doesn't feel that
way on your end, I truly am sorry you feel that way.