Tyrone Slothrop's horoscope

[vze422fs at verizon.net]

on 9/20/02 10:09 AM, David Morris at fqmorris at hotmail.com wrote:

> 
>> From: <vze422fs at verizon.net>
>> The legal drinking age for a pal of Joseph Kennedy's son in the 1930's,
>> such as Tyrone Slothrop, would be "old enough to order without slurring too
>> much or causing a fight".
> 
> I would agree with this.  And don't forget that the bar was in Roxbury,
> where legality would be second to making a buck.  Tyrone would as an
> undergraduate have been between 18 and 21.  I don't remember if we're told
> which year of College he's in...
> 
> DM
> 
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> 
Thanks for the backup. Where would Red Foxx and Malcom X be in this
particular scenario? My point was that you cannot infer someone's birth year
by the date at which he started drinking in a college city which is also a
merchant port with a substantial immigrant population and a history of
smuggling, corruption, back-room deals, and Catholicism. I frequent a bar
which proudly boasts that it did not close for prohibition. The mayor and
the police commissioner needed somewhere to meet for a beer. In a much later
decade, I drank at the Rat in Kenmore Square at age 16. I was considered a
regular. Pynchon knows Massachusetts culture.  Someone who guesses at a
character's age based upon legal drinking requirements in the Commonwealth
is orbiting a planet that I have never visited.

"I am shocked! Shocked to learn that gambling is going on in this
establishment!"

"Your winnings, sir"

"Thank you very much."

Still laughing,

Joe