oh my poor doomed ass

[Lucky Pierre]

--- Paul Mackin <paul.mackin at verizon.net> wrote:
> 
> Through The Dying Animal might be thought slight
> (too short) by
> comparison with Roth's other recent works, the
> attachment between the
> OLD dying animal and YOUNG one--the beautiful
> Consuela--and the
> depiction of what dying--especially dying when
> young--must be like--all
> seemed superbly drawn.
> 
> My usual reservation with Roth is how does the old
> guy so easily attract
> the beautiful young women. In this case there is a
> poetic justice in it
> all. Very very sad. Almost a downer of a book. But
> as T indicates so
> very very good.
> 
>  And, yes, as the two observe (watching TV on New
> Year's Eve), the
> Tropicana is quite sad too. Been there.
> 
> P.

Well, wouldn't keep suggesting this book if I didn't
think it is right up a Pynchon reader's valley.
Really, it is. I think the old prof getting it on with
the young student is just a bit too much in fictions
of late, all these 60's folks having flash-back
fantasies or what have you, but in DA I think it works
for a lot of reasons and on many different levels. One
has to do with celebrity status/privacy and the
culture hungry Cuban's powerful/power varacious
breasts. However, I imagine lots of readers thinking,
well...she's much too young and he's much too old. Why
not make her a "returning adult" student in her 30s.
Obviously to keep the Father Karamozov 60s stuff he
needs the prof to be yeat's dying animal and old man
among school children so the old man can be in good
shape but he needs to be an old man. He needs her to
be Cubana of that generation so he simply puts her in
an office dress and blouse. There is something about
the attraction of young students to their
"parent/grand-parent" professors that is quite
different from the attraction of young interns on
their knees have for presidents of nations and
corporations and other power/sexual relations. What is
this difference? 

Not sure and maybe I'm just putting my prick in my
mouth again, but I suspect it has something to do with
all this useless beauty and death. 


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