St Veronicas & The White Visitation

[jbor at bigpond.com]

On 22/12/2005 Mark Wright AIA wrote:

> His use of the
> word "Palladian" is imprecise at best unless The White Visitation goes
> through a cinematic metamorphosis at the end of the chapter.

What Pynchon describes at the end of the section (the "Whig 
eccentricities") are primarily interior refurbishments. There's nothing 
to say that the Palladian ground plan and foundation have been altered 
(though things like the minarets and gargoyles would certainly not have 
been original Palladian features.) As it's described, it's a "Palladian 
house" which has been "added to by each succeeding owner" over the 
centuries (like Basildon Park, for example), and it's set beside 
seacliffs down in Kent or East Sussex.

David is correct about Pynchon's misuse of the term "folly", by the 
way. Even the ruined Abbey on the grounds of TWV is a "real" ruin; the 
"ancient Abbey" was dismantled by Henry VIII, just like St Radigund's 
near Dover.

> But the original question was about St. Veronica's... On page 114
> Slothrop bumps into Darlene near St. Veronicas and Mrs. Quoad's abode,
> which P locates in the East End where "the dome of faraway St Paul's"
> is "visible in the smoke of certain afternoons." This isn't the City,
> it's away east in preterite territory where Slothrop is given to
> wander.

 From his cubicle at Grosvenor Square (Mayfair, where the American 
Embassy is), Slothrop walks to the East End (e.g. Wapping, Whitechapel, 
along the Thames) to try to shrug off his tail. He would need to walk 
past St Paul's to get to the East End. St Paul's is only about a mile 
and a half or two miles away from Wapping. Certainly Mrs Quoad lives in 
the East End, and Darlene works in St Veronica's nearby, but it's more 
likely that St Veronica's is back towards the city than east of the 
East End.

Your original suggestion that St Veronica's Hospital was a great house 
(like Knebworth) on the south east coast derived from a mix-up between 
TWV and St V's. It's not a slur on your architectural expertise and 
authority.

best