VLVL The Pisk Sisters--JAPs?

[davemarc]

From: jbor <jbor at bigpond.com>
>
> > Regarding the breakfast pastry known as Danish, jbor also wrote: "It's
> > misleading to assert that it is only or typically a
> > pauper's food." For the record, no one on this listserv has made such an
> > absurd
> > assertion.
>
> Amend to "It's misleading to suggest that ... "
>
> Thanks for the corrections.
>
You're welcome. But no one on this listserv has even suggested that Danish
is only or typically a pauper's food.

Danish is a breakfast pastry readily found in New York City, where it is
enjoyed by people of all economic classes. It's probably more available in
NYC than in most other parts of the world. As a bi-coastal friend remarked,
in Manhattan you can more or less step outside and get a Danish from a
sidewalk coffee vendor; it's much harder to make that kind of purchase in
California.

Here's an image of Danish:
http://www.wagnersbakery.com/_Products/Pasteries/danish.htm

Here's a Yale cafeteria menu that lists Danish at the same price as muffins,
scones, croissants, and a bagel with cream cheese:
http://www.yale.edu/dining/cat_breakfast.htm

That a Pisk sister kvetches about the absence of Danish on the West Coast
does not suggest that she is from a privileged background. The complaint
does, however, illustrate the narrator's assertion that "California's only
reality for [the Pisk sisters] was to be found in the million ways it failed
to be New York." This type of "typical New Yorker" bi-coastal shtick is
also "typically American" and depicted in countless essays, articles, and
comedy
routines.

I sincerely hope this information is useful to anyone who wishes to
contextualize Thomas Pynchon's use of the word "Danish" in Vineland.

d.