GRGR 1:5- "...laminar and gently singing"

[jbor at bigpond.com]

	On a wall, in an ornate fixture of darkening bronze,
	a gas jet burns, laminar and gently singing--adjusted
	to what scientists of the last century called a "sensitive
	flame": invisible at the base, as it issues from its orifice,
	fading upward into smooth blue light that hovers
	several inches above, a glimmering small cone that
	can respond to the most delicate changes in the room's
	air pressure. [...]

I read this descriptively. The flame is leaf-shaped and gently singing, 
i.e. making a songlike, hissing sound (as distinct from "singeing", in 
other words). The "changes in the room's air pressure" are caused by 
the entry and exit of people into hotel, as per the very next sentence: 
"It [the flame] registers visitors as they enter and leave ... "

Thus we're introduced to a seance in the side room of a crowded English 
pub. The setting (like Pirate's maisonette and the hothouse) is vividly 
rendered by Pynchon, and in a very economical way.

Apart from the connection between 19th C. Spiritualism and Freudian 
psychology which is being established here, I think the major insight 
we get in the first part of this section is into Jessica's character. 
She's very self-centred.

The "slender medium" is Carroll Eventyr, btw.

best