Foreword "Anti-Semitism"

[Paul Mackin]

On Fri, 2003-04-25 at 08:58, Mark Wright AIA wrote:

> Reminding myself of my take on this years ago now...
> >From the archives:
> ******
> Date: Mon, 7 Aug 2000 06:35:05 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Mark Wright AIA <mwaia@[omitted]>
> Subject: Re: WWII in GR
> To: Doug Millison <millison@[omitted]>
> Cc: pynchon-l@[omitted]
> 
> Howdy
> --- Doug Millison <millison@[omitted]> wrote:
> 
> > Dave wonders how this whole thread started. I'd date it to the 
> > beginning of GRGR, when I suggested that the "Ss" in "cast-iron 
> > pulleys whose spokes are shaped like Ss"  might be read as an 
> > allusion to the Nazi SS, and that it might be possible to read the 
> > opening of GR as an allusion to the death trains on their way to the 
> > concentration camps --  rj ridiculed that suggestion and went on to 
> > talk about the absence of the Holocaust from GR. As RJ has so 
> > consistently tried to minimize this aspect of the novel if not erase 
> > it from consideration altogether, I've made it a point to lift this 
> > material up for consideration.
> 
> And *I* would like to highlight the sensitivity of my own symbolical
> dowsing rod by reminding one and all of my perspicacity in pointing out
> back then that not only are the "Ss" in the pulley an unmistakable SS
> reference (nods to Doug), their circumscription by the "O" of the
> pulley makes the entire image also a reference to the OSS (Office of
> Strategic Services) which figures later in the text.  The density of
> meaning in those details which seem least significant makes this
> passage a spendid 'scription of Freudian dreamwork.  This density of
> meaning also characterizes the work as a whole.  Perhaps the way the
> Holocaust comes sloping in and out of view, through as sort of textual
> reflection and refraction, indicates that P felt that the Holocaust is
> such an enormity that if it were confronted more directly it would
> trump the moral complexities he intends to demonstrate? A light touch
> on the Holocaust allows him to illuminate the "Racketenstadt" within
> which we all live, and allows us to see WWII as somehting more than an
> Us (Good) vs Them (Evil) structure? 


Heck, and I thought SS was reference to the  practice mass canonization
of early martyrs (as in SS Perpetua and Felicita) or important
combinations such as SS Peter and Paul, thus announcing the important
Christianity theme of Gravity's Rainbow.

But seriously, at least Waffle-SS and OSS are more likely than Social
Security, Steam Ship, Sunday School, Sworn Statement and Staff Sergeant.

Nostalgically,

P.