Blowing in the wind?
Paul Nightingale
isread at btopenworld.com
Tue May 27 08:30:27 CDT 2003
Firstly, my thanks to Barbara (today) and Doug (last Friday, when I
posted) for their comments on my attempted overview of Pynchon's
Foreword.
And then, from Terrance: "Most of what Paul wrote can't stand up to a
stiff wind."
Most? Does that mean some of it does/can stand up? Do we need a stiff
wind in order to find out?
I think of stiff winds and think of Buster Keaton doing his own stunts.
I think of the wrong kind of leaves on the line (probably you have to
live here to get that ... a question of geography, not deficient
reading).
Well, there was a time when Terrance was prepared to be civil to me;
what I'm due now is petulant disdain. Nonetheless, I do recognise that
he asked the identity-question last Friday and I never got round to
replying. I did reply to his first post, at about one a.m., and then
unforgivably crawled off to bed. Given his hostility at the time, I seem
to remember thinking why bother?
What I wrote, of course, was no more than an outline (I called it
"sketchy"). It was designed to generate discussion, but I've long since
realised that what I call constructive dialogue is usually replaced on
the p-list by negative sniping.
However, if we're now to start discussing P's Foreword, and if it's
possible to do so seriously, I'm happy to comply.
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