VLVL The deal

[jbor]

>>>>> "Before he was to be cut loose, Zoyd had had to stand between
>>>>> two marshals (*.*) unobserved in the afternoon shade (...)."
>>>> 
>>>> Well, if you leave out the part about one of them being "his assailant,
>>>> Ron, unobserved in the afternoon shade", sure thing I guess.
>>> 
>>> Of course it's absolutely sure if you leave out "his assailant, Ron".
>> 
>> And, of course, when you read the text as written by Pynchon the words
> "his
>> assailant, Ron, unobserved in the afternoon shade" aren't left out at all.
>
> Yeah, but the question was to which person(s) this "unobserved" is related
> to.

Syntactically, it directly relates to Ron, and Ron alone. That's
incontrovertible. Whether Pynchon intended it to refer to Zoyd and the other
marshal as well is not possible to say, but if he did then there are a
number of ways he could have avoided ambiguity to convey that particular
meaning. That he hasn't done so inclines me to give him the benefit of the
doubt and accept that he did in fact write what he meant to write.

I think the paragraph reads perfectly well as it's actually written, without
deleting words and phrases to make it mean something different: Ron standing
in the shade, unobserved by everyone else, a sinister reminder to Zoyd to
behave.

best