SLSL: Nerissa and Hyacinth

[David Morris]

I love your analysis below.  It answers the question I asked T[erranc]ess about
a "dreamscape" reading of the story rather than a "political/literary history"
one.  But I don't find the need to figure out what is "really" happening in any
of Pynchon's works.  Personally I like to ignore that question, but in your
analysis I can see its value.  Flange and Nerissa *both* (and Pig too, for that
matter) are archetypes which will recur in various forms later  in _V_ and
_GR_.

I'm not sure I fully agree with your interpretation about this being Flanges
maturity-quest (my words) but it is a consistent one, so I can't argue against
it.  I think there is definitely a contrast between the two "wombs," and Pig
(representing a flagrantly self-centered hedonist (adult-child)) is the vehicle
which causes a transition from one to the other.  Flange was stagnating in his
life on the hill, his "rational" life, which fits with his deciding to play
hooky from work.  Pig's arrival is thus timely (as it could also have been seen
the first time he acted as a vehicle for Flange to temporarily escape
marriage).

The double-womb structure is a bit problematic for me.  Flange's hilltop house
with its lower-level rabbit-warren is his "womb w/a view," but the womb-like
portion should only be the basement.  The rationality part doesn't fit with a
womb.  And I guess that points out its inadequacy as a womb, which seems an
indictment of Cindy and her Mondrians, not Flange.  That also fits with
Flange's not being able to "think" until he gets away from Cindy.  I don't
think that Flange's tendency to seek a womb is a bad thing, since, as is
demonstrated in the dump, it leads to creativity and fulfillment.

My take doesn't fully hold water, but I think the confusion is partly Pynchon's
own ambivalence about the need/value of "growing up" which is a major theme in
_V_.

David Morris

--- The Great Quail <quail at libyrinth.com> wrote:
> 
> There is a 90% likelihood that this sequence is a fantasy being experienced
by Flange, brought on by several factors -- Bolingbroke's (possibly irrational
and imaginary) fear of "gypsies," Flange's "break-up" with Cindy, and the
telling of sea stories.
> 
> I believe that there are no actual gypsies -- as Rob says, their literary
purpose is to turn the dump into a more magical, mysterious place: gypsies are
to land what sailors are to sea: nomads, strange wanderers, a subset with their
own strange folkways, codes, moralities, languages, traditions, etc. It is
within this enchanted space that Flange has his dream, his pelagic blood
spinning its own sea story....
> 
> I find nothing lame, juvenile or even humorous about Nerissa and her rat. Why
is Nerissa a "midget?" Because she is the incomplete image of woman; not really
a midget at all. Indeed, she doesn't even appear to have the traditional
phenotypical characteristics of a midget; rather, she's a diminutive woman,
quite beautiful in an unearthly way -- a nereid. She springs from an
underground grotto deep inside of Flange's unconscious, where his romantic
notions of the sea are fed by a decidedly erotic current, and he has conflated
his desires into one all-purpose being representing the limitless,
undifferentiated potentials of the ocean, the joys of sexual dissolution, and
the unconditional comforts of motherhood. He always was a womb-seeker, as long
as that womb was not "relentless and rational;" in other words, intended for
its true purpose. Better a soft, snug, warm, sheltering, sexy, dark, accepting,
nourishing security.
> 
> But there's trouble in paradise: Hyacinth the pet rat. Like the protagonist
in David Lynch's "Eraserhead," Flange projects his fear of fatherhood onto/into
a monstrous being. The presence of this rat-baby destabilizes the fantasy, and
calls forth the first and only "mature" question Flange asks: Why has he and
Cindy not yet had a child?
> 
> I feel that this is the pivotal moment of the story, and I also see hope for
Flange. Nerissa acquires another level of meaning -- a child-figure, and like
HCE's thoughts about his daughter Izzy in "Finnegans Wake," there is an almost
incestuous epiphany of age and maturation. So while Flange is not yet ready to
face the real world, he indicates to Nerissa that he will stay for only
"awhile." He sees the truth behind her eyes....

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