Berlin (GR 434)

[Dave Monroe]

Actually, that's an astute observation on both your
and, I suspect, Pynchon's part, I imagine that's
precisely why he deploys "salt" there, because all teh
other tastes have been covered.  So why not "salt"? 
There's an awful lot of playful disruption of the
expectations of everyday language in Those Pynchonian
Texts, no?  "YESES, NOES, NEGRO SUPPORTERS, WOMEN
SUPPORTERS, ATHLETIC oh, come now," to give a not esp.
good example, off the top of my head ...

http://de.geocities.com/geri130162/pyv20008.htm

But what might "salt" mean here?  Perhaps ...

Main Entry: salt
Function: adjective
1 a : SALINE, SALTY b : being or inducing the one of
the four basic taste sensations that is suggestive of
seawater -- compare BITTER, SOUR, SWEET
[...]
4 : SHARP, PUNGENT

Main Entry: salt
Function: adjective
Etymology: by shortening & alteration from assaut,
from Middle English a sawt, from Middle French a saut,
literally, on the jump
obsolete : LUSTFUL, LASCIVIOUS

http://m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary

Okay, very good, thanks again, Albert ...

> albert
> 
> So when Slothrop leaves his room with Margherita to
> deliver the hashish the narr. describes night Berlin
> with, "The salt ache of accordian music cries on in
> back of them." (434)
>
> Now, I know the emotions of sweet, sour, and
> bitter-- but salt? I'd be an interesting emotion to
> add to a palate, but what is it?


		
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail