NPPR: Commentary Line 137 Lemniscate

Jasper Fidget fakename at verizon.net
Tue Sep 23 07:58:32 CDT 2003


The lemniscate in Shade's poem is left by "nonchalantly deft bicycle tires"
on wet sand.  So (distancing myself from assertions here):

1) Is the pattern created deliberately or by accident?  How?  By lying the
bicycle down on its side?  By riding it in a figure 8?  Or through spinning
the front wheel alone in two circles?

2) Sand implies a beach, which is another border zone, a cusp between
natural elements of earth and water.  (Like a bicircular intersection?)

3) Remembering some anagrams for Kinbote: I BE KNOT, BE KIN TO, BIKE NOT

Jasper Fidget




More information about the Pynchon-l mailing list