NPPF - Foreword - Summary / Commentary (3)

[jbor]

In my copy there's a glaring grammatical error in the first sentence of this
paragraph as well. The sequence of sentences reads as follows:

        Frank has acknowledged the safe return of the galleys I had been
    sent here and has asked me to mention in my Preface -- and this I
    willingly do -- that I alone am responsible for any mistakes in my
    commentary. Insert before a professional. A professional proofreader
    has carefully rechecked [...]

Is the solecism of "the galleys I had been sent here" merely a coincidental
typo in the Penguin edition, or is it the standard?

I think your first observation is correct. "Insert before a professional" is
Kinbote's instruction about where to insert the preceding sentence, the note
which "good old Frank", no doubt covering himself against responsibility for
the "mistakes" (a hilarious understatement) in Kinbote's commentary, has
asked him to include.

The process I see is that the manuscript went to Frank, the galleys were
returned to Kinbote with Frank's request to add the disclaimer, Kinbote
wrote the additional sentence and the direction as to where it should be
inserted, the "professional proofreader" checked the text of the poem (only,
I think) in the galleys and found "trivial misprints" (which may or may not
have been "trivial", and which may or may not have been corrected by
Kinbote), and then it all went back to the printer, who mistakenly
incorporated Kinbote's direction along with the additional sentence.

best


on 15/7/03 2:01 AM, gumbo at fuse.net wrote:

> Okay, I guess there are at least two ways to reconstruct how the "Insert
> before a professional" interjection got in the text.
> 
> My first thought was that it was a slightly garbled version of a proofing note
> to insert the word "professional" before the word "proofreader."
> 
> It makes more sense as a note that was set in type by mistake at the bottom of
> the text insert, which is the preceding sentence: "Frank has acknowledged the
> safe return..." 
> 
> A much neater explanation. The inserted sentence is something that _would_
> have to be inserted, the product of a note from the publisher to the editor
> after a review of the galley proofs.
> 
> My take on this is still that it shows there was a process of preparing the
> manuscript for publication under way. Seems to me the (fictional) typesetter's
> mistaken inclusion of the instruction is a pretty pointed indication that
> hands other than Kinbote's were at work on the project. (That is, that the
> poem and commentary have a reality outside of Kinbote's delusion.)
> 
> Don Corathers 
> 
> 
>> 
>> From: The Great Quail <quail at libyrinth.com>
>> Date: 2003/07/14 Mon AM 11:36:04 EDT
>> To: The Whole Sick Crew <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>> Subject: Re: NPPF - Foreword - Summary / Commentary (3)
>> 
>>> He says the poem has been proofed, if not the
>>> commentary. 
>>> 
>>> And the very next sentence: "insert before a
>>> professional."  Followed by "A professional ..."
>> 
>> Yeah, I find this a very puzzling item, and it seems to be a "clue" to
>> *something.* Did the proofreader who looked at the poem also look at the
>> foreword, but Kinbote, being rather in a tizzy, failed to note a comment? Or
>> is it a note by Kinbote to himself that was accidentally retained?