MDDM Scalping Lord Lepton

[jbor]

on 29/6/04 10:48 PM, jbor wrote:

>> 1. If the issue is identifying the owner of the rifle then the fact that
>> Mason and Dixon recognise *the* scalp is the salient piece of information.
>> It's irrelevant that as the rifle is produced by Catfish it's described in
>> the text as "a Lancaster rifle". This reference occurs prior to the boys
>> seeing the scalp and then realising for sure *whose* rifle it is.

Note also that the owner of the scalp is conclusively identified as the
"owner" (681) of the rifle. M&D do react to the rifle, by the way:

    Mason sees it first,-- then, tipped by his frozen silence, Dixon. (680)

And it's the narrator who tells us that Catfish is "packing a Lancaster
rifle" (680), which is what LeSpark has insinuated that Lord Lepton's weapon
is, or is modeled upon (429). On the strength of M&D's very strong reaction
when they see the rifle it's entirely reasonable to suggest that they do
recognise it straight away as the one they saw at Lepton's. I can't think of
any other reason why Dixon, "with a look of unsuccessfully feign'd
innocence", would ask about its "owner", and who else the boys might
recognise the scalp as belonging to (681).

>> 2. In Ch. 42 Mason contends that it is a Cape rifle, but Dixon avers that it
>> is an American rifle (428.12), and it is then the narrator, not LeSpark, who
>> confirms that Dixon is correct (429.4-5).

It had been argued that it is only LeSpark who says that it is an American
rifle, which is incorrect. Further, NB that the star on Lepton's rifle is
inverted (428) just like the one on the rifle in Catfish's possession (680).
The one painted on the tavern sign in Lancaster Town is similarly "revers'd"
(342), and not right side up, as was argued.

The rifle at Lepton's, and the rifle Catfish produces (and the sign in
Lancaster Town), are not unstable artefacts at all They are all very "real"
and definitive in the context of the narrative Pynchon has created. The
debate was actually about whether the rifle at Lepton's is the same one that
is produced by Catfish, and the answer to that question is what has been
made deliberately inconclusive by Pynchon. It's always interesting to
witness the angst that that sort of characteristic postmodernist
indeterminacy causes some readers.

>> 3. For all the twaddle about "renowned frontiersman" and "wild and unknown
>> Ohio", and Daniel Boone and Steven Seagal, Lord Lepton actually makes it
>> quite clear that he has travelled in the region and he even insinuates that
>> he has had trade dealings with the Indians there (418.22-6). Further, the
>> narrator informs us that on his arrival in America Lepton spent five years
>> working in mines, driving "African slaves", and travelling "up-country" as a
>> "Journeyman" (416-7).
>> 
>> It might also be worthwhile recalling that Catfish uses a saddle and speaks
>> fluent English (680-1). When we first encounter Catfish in the narrative
>> with "his Lady, and his Nephew" they are "all dress'd as Europeans might
>> be", and he is apparently on a "Mission", "as if Disguis'd", and "Looking
>> for Business" (673).

One of the points here is that Catfish has actually come *east*, "far from
his Village" (673), when first he and "his Lady, and his Nephew", meet up
with M&D and the party. Thus, it's not unreasonable to suggest that
Catfish's "Business" and his "Mission" lie in the east, and it's also not
unreasonable to suggest that Catfish's "Business" and his "Mission" might
have something to do with "the White Man I have wished to meet for a long
time" (681), as he tells the boys later on. East is where Lepton Castle is,
of course, and Lepton does insinuate that he had got the better of "the
Indians" in business dealings over those coal reserves out west (418.22-6).
These clues add up.

The twaddle, of course, is the repeated straw man argument that Lepton is a
"renowned frontiersman" or Steven Seagal, Chuck Norris, Natty Bumppo, Daniel
Boone or whoever. No-one ever made that argument; and nor would one need to
in order to suggest that he is the likely victim, particularly seeing as how
Catfish is explicitly announced as the aggressor.

>> 4. And, for the fourth or fifth time now, the point I've been making isn't
>> that the text unequivocally identifies the owner of the scalp as Lord
>> Lepton, or anyone else -- in a typically postmodernist gesture Pynchon
>> leaves the identity of the victim indeterminate. Only M&D know for sure
>> whose scalp it is; the information is deliberately withheld from the reader.
>> In fact, it's a reversal of traditional dramatic irony.

> And, just like all the different manifestations of second person address in
> _GR_, this too is a reflexive strategy; suddenly all that the mirror of the
> text reflects is an image of the reader engaged in an act of reading.

>> In spite of this,
>> all the evidence points to Lord Lepton as the most likely candidate.

See above.

best