jewel block / Dance the Eagle to Sleep / blurbs

[Michael Bailey]

On 1/22/06, Toby G Levy <tobylevy at juno.com> wrote:
>
>         Seaman Bodine is spending his time in obscene amusement

had to know what a jewel block is:

{Jewel block} (Naut.), block at the extremity of a yard,
   through which the halyard of a studding sail is rove.

so Bodine would be sitting astride the yardarm to get close to this thing?
---------------------------------
Just read "Dance the Eagle to Sleep" - possible influence on some of
the College of the Surf scenes in Vineland.  However unlikely that
I'll be spoiling it for anybody, still I'll skip a few lines






She takes 3 main guy characters, and 2 main girl characters, maybe
chooses the most susceptible to the revolutionary ethos: the
lower-class dreamer with a visionary gift (Corey), the smart kid too
early to profit from the Revenge of the Nerds mentality (Billy), the
pampered artist type (Shawn) / Jill/Joanna rebellious Army brat and
Ginny, sweet girl who's misconstrued as a dumb slut....
the chemistry of the guys (and girls, because at first they are happy
to release their energy more freely) at first gels to produce a
movement and a commune, the girls get oppressed by the new regime but
in reality supply its reality

then things get heavy, the temptation of militarism is yielded to

and there is mass carnage as the System asserts control (who was saved?)

also a 4th guy character (Marcus) emerges, when a group of black urban
youths first "takes over" a national forest area, and then is picked
off one by one till only he remains - Piercy anticipates the "reality
show" by having TV crews follow the National Guard around in this
police action

Ginny picks up Marcus at the meetpoint and trucks him to safety, Billy
gets offed in hopeless battle against the Man, Corey gets bulldozed
after impregnating Ginny, Joanna gets captured and re-programmed by
shock and insulin therapy, Shawn gets half-blinded

(the group called themselves "Indians" and Ghost Dancing was part of
Corey's early vision - there were lots of them for awhile)

after limping away, Shawn and Marcus see Ginny thru labor, in a cabin
on a road not on the map, and they still think that the system needs
to change -- and that's where she leaves it

anyway - cautionary tale, for those who remember how very serious some
of us were about "the Revolution" -- these were real outcomes for
people I knew (not close friends, mostly, since I was a bit young for
all that) - the book came out in 1970 and hopefully scared some kids
into staying out of the worst of it...

analysis of the Youth Movement through emotional and sympathetic eyes,
carrying things a step further than they mostly actually went here
(thank goodness)

She makes so clear how many things were missing from the revolutionary
worldview, yet how compelling the feelings were

----------- Pynchon blurbs
I didn't know he had blurbed so many: I do have some reading to do!
from a Keith McMullen post in 2002 there are

> Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me
> Richard Fariña

> My Escape from the CIA (And Other Improbable Events)
> Hughes Rudd

> Looking for Baby Paradise
> John Speicher

> DeFord
> David Shetzline
>
> Nog
> Rudolph Wurlitzer
>
> Dance the Eagle to Sleep
> Marge Piercy
>
> Ayisha
> Helen Noga
>
> SDS: Ten Years Toward a Revolution
> Kirkpatrick Sale
>
> Amazon One
> Mary F. Beal
>
> Far Tortuga
> Peter Matthiessen
>
> Even Cowgirls Get the Blues
> Tom Robbins
>
> Pagan Blessing
> Phyllis Gebauer
>
> Sounding the Territory
> Laurel Goldman
>
> Days Between Stations
> Steve Erickson
>
> Lion at the Door
> David Attoe
>
> Destiny Express
> Howard A. Rodman
>
> Stone Junction: An Alchemical Potboiler
> Jim Dodge
>
> Mao II
> Don DeLillo
>
> Mad Dog
> Jack Kelly
>
> We've Had A Hundred Years of Psychotherapy And The
> World's Getting Worse
> James Hillman and Michael Ventura
>
> Arc d'X
> Steven Erickson
>
> Evolove (Poems)
> John Berenzy
>
> CivilWarLand in Bad Decline: Stories and a Novella
> George Saunders
>
> Sewer, Gas & Electric: The Public Works Trilogy
> Matt Ruff
>
> Dreamland: Travels Inside the Secret World of
> Roswell and Area 51
> Phil Patton
>
> The Restraint of Beasts
> Magnus Mills
>
> Slackjaw
> Jim Knipfel
>
> The Testament of Yves Gundron
> Emily Barton
>
> A confraria dos espadas
> Rubem Fonseca
>
> The Verificationist
> Donald Antrim
>
>