LPPM MMV "Zeit the Doctor"

[Otto]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <cwleise at buffalo.edu>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2004 9:40 PM
Subject: Re: LPPM MMV "Zeit the Doctor"


> "Dave Monroe wrote:
>      "... he still remembered Miriam's husband cursing
>      Zeit the Doctor ..." (MMV, p. 1)
>
>      Zeit the Doctor = time heals all wounds?
>
>      See VL page 208"
>
> Cute, yes, but I suspect quite the opposite: Zeit's inability to
> successfully intervene with the progress of Miriam's cancer is just
> the first clue that the story suggests time has a far lesser ability
> to effectuate the process of healing than the above platitude would
> have us believe.
>

This is exactly the way I would expect Pynchon to deal with
"the above platitude."

>
> However, I think there is something interesting going on with the
> conflation of time with 'doctoring' that is not necessarily 'healing':
> the narrator states earlier on that Siegel has spent time "wondering
> why, in his first days with the Commission, he should have ever
> regarded himself as any kind of healer when he had always known that
> for a healer -- a prophet actually, because if you cared about it at
> all you had to be both -- there is no question of balance sheets or
> legal complexity, and the minute you become involved with anything
> like that you are something less; a doctor, or a fortune-teller."
>

Interesting juxtaposition, isn't it? With a clear hierarchy.

healer vs doctor
prophet vs fortune-teller

>
> After you pointed that out, I noticed that time/times/Zeit makes
> nineteen appearances in the text, often in close proximity to one
> another.  In addition, the sense in which it is used changes
> frequently -- notably, when referring to the Siegel, it generally
> refers to individual circumstances: "There had been times -- during
> the past year, in the Avenue Kleber or the Viale delle Terme di
> Caracalla -- where there had been a brief case where the fifth was
> now, clutched under the same tweed-clad arm against rain or a deadline
> or some bureaucratic necessity. And most of these times...", whereas
> when referring to the Ojibway, 'times' delineates
> collective/social/cultural designations: "such paranoid tendencies are
> further intensified bv the highly competitive life of the summer
> villages at ricing and berry-picking time..."  Further, in the action
> of the story, Siegel is somewhat lost to time: he's unsure when to
> show up, exactly; his early arrival creates the circumstances that
> allow him to gather enough information to avoid the carnage; when he
> realizes what time is (eleven o'clock) he abandons his role of
> father/confessor and walks outside, a form of "deliverance" that
> Lupescu told Siegel would come, that it was "just a matter of time"
> (though I think Lupescu is somewhat wrong: he's more telling fortune
> than being prophetic)...
>
> Finally, in a great big stretch of critical license, I noted that time
> is actually at the center of the word sentiment, quite literally:
> another word of great import to the tale.
>

The story begins with an information about the time, like the word order
requires: time info before place info.

When time and a clash of cultures are topics one has to ask if it's linear
or cyclical time. It's clear that the Windigo psychosis is the result of
constant cyclical repetitions of natural phenomena bringing hardship to the
Ojibwa, thus they are exposed to a cyclical time that allows no development
or escape but (inevitably?) leads to that kind of mass-psychosis.

Linear time is a product of the Enlightenment. But the "whole sick crew" at
the party is hardly grown-up, let alone enlightened. One only has to compare
what is told about the Ojibwa by Debby Considine --

"At ricing time, you see, all the families are together, everyone happy,
Togetherness in Ojibwa land. Blasts, brawls, sex orgies, community sings,
puberty rituals. All kinds of wonderful local color to fill up notebook
after notebook with."

-- and what Siegel knows about it from Professor Mitchell:

"You must remember that this group lives forever at the brink of
starvation," Mitchell said in that deprecating, apologetic tone which
implied that for him all cultures were equally mad; it was only the form
that differed, never the content. "It has been said that the Ojibwa ethos is
saturated with anxiety," and simultaneously 50 pens copied the sentence
verbatim. "The Ojibwa are trained, from childhood, to starve; the male
child's entire upbringing is dedicated to a single goal: that of becoming a
great hunter. Emphasis is on isolation, self-sufficiency. There is no
sentimentality among the Ojibwa. It is an austere and bleak existence they
lead, always one step away from death."

> Sorry about the length, but I get bored at work.  Anyhow, I was
> interested in what you all thought about this: I have a crackpot
> theory of my own, sort of, but would love some input.
>
> Cheers,
> Chris

I very much liked it, no excuse necessary I'd say.

Otto