1984 Foreword "fascistic disposition"

[Paul Nightingale]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On
> Behalf Of Paul Mackin
> Sent: 01 May 2003 00:58
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Subject: Re: 1984 Foreword "fascistic disposition"
> 
> On Wed, 2003-04-30 at 13:58, Paul Nightingale wrote:
> > The fact of the matter is, the paragraph in question is perfectly
clear.
> 
> Well, there is certainly disagreement about it. There's not much Paul
N.
> and I agree on but that it is Wednesday. (sorry Rob, majority rules)
> 
As you can see from the header above it's already Thursday. Damn those
certainties! Publication day for 1984 in these colonial parts. While
waiting I'll try to address our other disagreements.
>
> 
> The first part of P's first  sentence is dreadful. To me the word
> "fascistic" sounds at least in part like sarcasm or extreme hyperbole,
> because in point of literal fact there is nothing heinous about
pointing
> out that full civil liberties, etc., may be a luxury that wartime
> exigencies cannot afford? However the reader can't be sure Pynchon
> doesn't perhaps actually mean "fascistic" here to some degree
literally.
> We (or I should say I) hoped this was not so for the simple reason
that
> it doesn't make literal sense. This is why in my own revision of the
> paragraph I completely redid the first half of the first
> sentence,leaving out the questionable sarcasm.
>
I fail to see why the sentence doesn't make "literal sense". It does to
me. There is nothing wrong with "fascistic" (as a word, I'm not so happy
about the tendencies). Why is it "extreme hyperbole"? That would suggest
that Pynchon is caricaturing reality. In fact, you then go on to
caricature what P wrote. I hope he offers you the job of editor on his
next novel - man, his writing needs a little attention.
> 
> (Let me dispose of the awful possibility (as Father Rapier might put
it)
> that P is picking up completely on 1984 (in which if I remember
rightly
> Oceana is ALWAYS being bombed) and is assuming in this paragraph that
> wartime is the ONLY time and that what the pointer-outers are pointing
> out is that there was and is NEVER NEVER NEVER a time for the luxury
of
> civil liberties and other expectations of normalcy. It would be a
pretty
> crazy take off point for a serious discussion, but I thought I'd
better
> cover the base in case someone besides me thought of it.)
>
In fact Stalin's Russia from the early-30s assumed a state of ongoing
war against capitalism. During the cold war 'encirclement' described the
way in which the enemy had surrounded the country and attack/invasion
was imminent. Goofy moustache thinking, of course. Nowadays, in the war
against terrorism, the enemy is everywhere and might strike at any
moment - similar fears shaped attitudes in WW2 Britain (eg your own
reference to careless talk) and justified, not just reasonable
curtailment of civil liberties but measures that were questioned by
many, not just on the left. Angus Calder's excellent The People's War
describes the radicalisation of those who would previously have thought
themselves law-abiding moderates (as indeed happens now, every time the
police attack a peaceful demo).
>
> .
> Now for Paul's specific points 1-6:
> 
Well, holding my breath here, I get away with it for 1-3. I get away
with it for 4 until:
> 
> "Unseemliness" sounds a bit
> weak if
> by it is meant "harmfulness," which I think makes the most sense.
> 
> Is this another bit of tongue in cheek?
>
Are you saying unseemliness = harmfulness? Because it doesn't. Are you
saying Pynchon has used the word in this way? Because he hasn't. It's an
unusual word, admittedly, which means we might pay a bit more attention
to why he has used it. I know P's not a very good writer, and he does
need a decent editor badly, but humour me here. If something is unseemly
it is inappropriate. The word connotes the impropriety of one's actions.
The arguments/prophesy in question are considered unseemly. One commits
a social faux pas by asking politely for a by-election to be held during
wartime (one of the examples discussed by Calder). Bad manners. It might
be thought "tongue in cheek". Perhaps irony.
> 
> 
> > In the second part of the paragraph P deals with the prewar thinking
> > that has opposed undemocratic government. Be it an argument or a
> > prophesy of what will or might happen.
> >
> 
> 
> The problem was there wasn't really a discussion of prewar thinking in
> this particular segment. Prewar thinking was more referred to than
> described.
>
I wrote "deals with"; not "discusses" or "describes". He alludes to it.
Prewar thinking is clearly the subtext, or part of it.
> 
> 
> > 5. This argument is based on principles that are not opportunistic,
as
> > the measures introduced by Churchill's war cabinet, as cited, might
be
> > described.
> 
> .
> Using the term "opportunistic" to describe Churchill's actions implies
> he was using wartime necessity merely as an excuse  to introduce harsh
> restrictions on freedom, when the overwhelming preponderant view was
> that the restrictions on actions and freedoms were necessary to
winning
> the war.
>
Some restrictions might be considered necessary. Others follow as a
matter of course. Once They have got this law through, They'll try it on
with something more extreme. P is talking about the way power is
exercised. WW2. Bush's America post-9/11. Britain in the 1980s, when
Thatcher's government pushed through one anti-trade union measure after
another. Thatcher, incidentally, spoke of the miners as "the enemy
within". Which I think also starts to cover your objections to point 6:
>
>
> > 6. Viewed objectively, leaving aside for one moment the
circumstances,
> > and any justifications arising from those circumstances, the
government
> > has behaved in the same way as a fascist government.
> 
> I hope we don't leave "the circumstances" aside for too long a moment
> because it cannot be assumed that the circumstances of WW II, namely
the
> need to win under quite unfavorable odds, were not at least as
important
> as following a strict adherence to peace time freedom of speech and
> action. In other words you're not viewing things at all objectively.
>
Pynchon's point is polemical here. Given what has gone before, "the
circumstances" are not only what can be described objectively, bombs
falling, people dying etc, but also the way in which the government
might exploit people's fears by forever invoking the threat of what
might happen. Again, not just a wartime strategy. Don't rock the boat,
we'll be invaded next week. Or, conventional business tactics in a
peacetime capitalist economy: don't ask for a payrise, we can't afford
it, you'll lose your job.
>
>
> I'll stick with my original reconstruction, which was as logical as I
> could make
> it without taking Pynchon out completely.
>
Is "taking out" here Sopranospeak? More irony, I feel, from one who set
out to rewrite what P wrote to make it fit in with what he, the dutiful
editor, wanted it to mean.