meta-P-list WAS Re: Foreword, when is a homeland not a homeland?

[pynchonoid]

--- s~Z <keithsz at concentric.net> wrote:
> [...]  It
> is almost impossible,
> with this many opinionated voices talking
> simultaneously in a written forum,
> to keep the specifics clear regarding who really
> said what. [...]  If
> this many people get
> involved enough to enjoy this silliness, so be it.

The P-list, at its best, reminds me of that staple of
the Chinese variety show, the "cross-talk" comedy act,
featuring two people (often a City Mouse/Country Mouse
duo)who speak different dialects of Chinese.  The
humor comes from their mutual misunderstandings
arising from slight differences in pronunciation and
producing progressively more complex and obscure
ramifications. (Because Chinese is a tonal language, a
very slight change in sound -- generally undetectable
to the untrained non-Chinese ear -- produces words
sometimes wildly at odds with the sense the word or
sentence might offer if pronouced differently, the
nearest thing I can think of in English is  Abbot and
Costello's "Who's on first?")  In the hands of 
skilled practitioners the resulting dialogues can be
quite funny.  The same sort of misunderstandings
between strangers in the street might likely lead to
harsh words, hurt feelings, a physical altercation. 


=====
<http://www.pynchonoid.blogspot.com/>

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