(spoilers) ok, finished 1st pass // family connection (spoiler) // Carlson

[mikebailey at speakeasy.net]

Freaking beautiful
now, what's it all mean? 
I really like Cyprian, does that make me a poofter?
Another character I really like is Dally's father. And Mayva. 
Webb, Reef, Frank, Lake and Kit haven't resolved in my vision as much as those 3. Yet. 
Is Basnight/Deuce a kind of Werfner/Renfrew opposition? Deuce evolving into a Manson-like character (sans harem) was a shock; I see him as a proto-Brock Vond, and Lake falling for the same kind of thing in him that Frenesi did in Vond. One reviewer couldn't credit the attraction, but I think Pynchon "limns" the character of Deuce quite nicely. Basnight and Lake might have a future at the very end. There is some kind of eigenvalue or something anyway.
I'm in a small minority who thinks of Pynchon as a Christian writer (ducking the brickbats) (not the figtree-cursing crusader kind but the Christ as gentle anarchist kind, bear ye one another's burdens, good shepherd sort of thing)
one thing that jibes with that is how that anarchist preacher borrows the Christer Jephthah's wagon to go picking up lost souls, and lets "Jeff" buy his wagonload (except of course the Traverse family member with whom the anarchist guy has business) for a quarter a head when the latter comes running up in indignation. 
but looking back at what seems to me a seminal event: Webb's conversion to anarchism occurs when a Christian preacher gives the soulsearching Webb a hurried and insufficient explanation, leaving him to that anarchist dude (sort of the opposite of the Jephthah-wagon-action), suggesting the appeal of anarchism is quasi religious and occurs in a field ignored by religion when it became too tied up with the plutes and unresponsive to human needs, forgetting the "come unto me ye who labor and are heavy laden"
I don't think anybody will try to think Pynchon holds a brief for the bomb-throwing variety of anarchism, as he has taken great pains to portray it as a cause of misery -- 
--------- family connection spoiler p 1000 or so
Certainly the Traverse family reappears in Vineland...and how about that teacher, Mr Becker, who gives Jesse an A+ for his essay on "What it means to be an American" -- aren't there some Beckers in Vineland
----------- there's a passel of references to the "Wagonlit" train service, I guess that is the same company that today is called Carlson Wagonlit? I think of a wagon with lights in the windows...
anagrams:
Reef Traverse - FETA EVER ERRS
(suits me, I've never fancied Feta)
Webb Traverse - WAR BESET VERB
(his war besets the action of his life?)
Cyprian Latewood A CAD PILE TORN YOW (some of that rough trade?)
Yashmeen Halfcourt - AN ALCHEMY SHE OF RUT
Sloat Fresno - SNARL FOE SOT
also, is the "Chums" auctorial aside about the adventure that his readers didn't like perhaps a reference to Vineland?
the only part I really didn't read with much attention was the Chums under the sand, I was pining for more Venice, I guess, and more about those Lens crafters
buncha more illformed hypotheses, need to lurk some more and study up on my Deleuze and Guattari, also Lacan, visualize the luminiferous ether, buy some iceland spar and fuss with it, also haven't even finished reading "Education of Henry Adams" yet -- ttfn

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