"The Evacuation still proceeds..." GR Part 1 Section 1

[jbor at bigpond.com]

On 31/10/2005 Paul Nightingale wrote:

> I think it reasonable to discuss the way a text works, rather than
> simply assume the power to say what it means.

I don't believe you can address "the way the text works" in isolation 
from what the text says, what it's about -- plot, characters, themes, 
historical and intertextual contexts, and so forth. Perhaps with the 
type of functionalist approach you advocate you might be coming at 
these things from another direction -- I'd be a bit concerned if you 
weren't going to get there at all, however.

I also don't think it's reasonable to stereotype all readers as reading 
in a particular way. And I think for most of us reading in this 
particular go-round it's a second, third, fourth, fifth, etc reading. 
So it's very different from a first reading. But what the opening 
sequence does do for even a first time reader is to establish specifics 
of time and place, a sense of character (vague though it is), and an 
expectation that what is happening here, and its significance, will be 
made clear. (It's actually made clear, and then ultimately made less 
clear, I think.)

I don't know anyone who expects to read a text and have everything laid 
out for them on the first page. And I also think that part of what 
Pynchon's novel does is keep bringing you back to certain sections, 
certain passages, and to this opening sequence especially. It's not 
until quite a few readings that a reader will pick up the veiled 
allusions to the Nazi death camp transports, for example, and the way 
that Pynchon has crafted references to that particular and most 
horrific aspect of the Holocaust through the use of a dreaming 
telepath. And I think this then becomes a key to other scenes, and a 
way of working out why direct references to the Shoah are nowhere to be 
found in the text. (Still not buying the argument that Dora = 
Auschwitz.)

I'm also warming to the added connotation of the word "evacuation" in 
terms of Pirate emptying out his subconscious through dream so that, 
when he wakes, he can take a piss "without a thought in his head" (p. 
6). Although, this technique is identified as "a Commando trick" on the 
next page. (I also think that Pirate looking at his watch but not 
registering anything, and various other time references in the opening 
half dozen or so pages, including those first two lines of the text, 
might be worth investigating more closely.)

The pronoun "it" in the second sentence refers to the noun phrase "the 
screaming" in the first sentence. That's how language works: 
theme/reme, given/new, lexical cohesion etc. Similarly, the "him" and 
"he" on p. 3 morph into a "you" on p. 4. Both pronouns refer to 
whoever's point(s) of view Pirate's subconscious has recalled, and 
adopted or appropriated in the dream. That's my take, anyway -- but 
just because they're pronouns doesn't mean they have no referents. 
Quite the opposite in fact.

As others have said I think that what the screaming is is quite 
important. Literally speaking, I think it's the sound that wakes Pirate 
up, most probably the air raid siren warning Londoners of the "Incoming 
mail" rocket from Katje. Yes, there's a rocket, and yes, in all 
likelihood there's a siren. I think we can infer that. Why not? There's 
specific content there in the narrative and specific historical 
information that we can use to make these interpretations. But there 
are of course also other thematic and symbolic connotations to the 
sound, which accumulate as we read on, and again ("a progressive 
*knotting into*") -- but I don't think it's such a stretch or 
contradiction to suggest that Pirate's subconscious has incorporated 
the actual sound into the dream (I'm sure everyone has had a similar 
alarm clock or ringing telephone experience) and it has set off this 
incredibly detailed and resonant scenario, which might have any number 
of referents, keeping in mind both Pirate's peculiar talent and the way 
that dreams are generated. And, going a step further, why not the idea 
that Pirate is dreaming "our" dreams -- postmodernist novel that this 
one most certainly is -- and "our" dreams back in those Cold War 1960s 
and early '70s would have been very much haunted by the prospect of 
nuclear apocalypse.

So, no, the idea that there is no meaning is no more valid or useful 
(to me, anyway) than the idea that everything means everything.

best

> In particular, the opening
> pages of a novel will introduce settings, characters, relationships,
> concerns, etc: how this is done, the choices made by the author, should
> be of some interest. Moreover, we don't find out but conclude that it
> has been a dream, just as we conclude that the he-character in the 
> first
> passage can be identified as the he-character subsequently named as
> Captain Prentice.
>
> The early reference to "[t]he Evacuation" (and capitalisation =
> stylisation, which in and of itself begs the question) doesn't really
> tune the reader in, given the reluctance of context to give up meaning.
>
> 2 - And then ...
>
> The first sentence can't be decoded, no matter how badly we want it. We
> can argue forever that the screaming in question is this or that. In
> fact, the sound (any sound) is outside the scope of the novel, so
> designating it a scream(ing) comes within the text, a judgement made by
> a character or the narrative voice. (DePalma's Blow Out, anyone?)
>
> I think it noteworthy that this particular first sentence is followed 
> by
> one that, at the very least, invokes the relationship between signifier
> and signified. Again, we conclude that the "it" in the second sentence
> does refer to the screaming, although whether it refers to (i) the 
> sound
> itself, or (ii) the response to it, the aftermath, or (iii) the cause 
> of
> the sound, or (iv) everything whatsoever to do with it, will remain a
> matter for conjecture.