des mots d'escalier

[Doug Millison]

Keith:
>As I think Terrance will eventually demonstrate, if you string
>together all of the text
>regarding Dixon and the issue of pacifism, Dixon in M&D is no
>believer in pacifism.

I don't think I've said Dixon *believes* in pacifism.  I read this
encounter with the slave driver to show that his actions in this instance
express the nonviolent approach to social justice, in a way that his
actions didn't when Dixon stood by and watched the Dutchmen abuse Austra
the slave-whore-on-a-leash in the brothel earlier in the novel, or when
Dixon himself has taken advantage of the local native girls like those in
the All-Nations, etc. Pynchon places Dixon in a situation where he has the
opportunity to choose to continue the violence or stop the violence, and he
chooses to stop it, not by examining his beliefs, but by examining his
conscience. This seems to me to be an important moment in the development
of the character that Pynchon is creating.