The first magenta and green? (was

[Anville Azote]

On 6/12/06, jbor at bigpond.com <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> To illustrate, one of the things which I don't believe has ever been
> successfully resolved is the provenance or significance of that colour
> combination which recurs throughout Pynchon's work from GR on:
>
> "The Heath grows green and magenta in all directions" (GR 749)
>

Forgive me if this has already been mentioned, but "A Companion's
Companion" states that these colors are the "coal-tar colors of
organic chemistry" (gloss on line V69.14).

http://english2.mnsu.edu/larsson/gr1.html

Actually, I'd guess that "green and mauve" would be a better choice
for alluding to coal tar and the color industry it spawned.  William
Perkin stumbled onto his "mauve" in 1856 -- the world's first
artificial dye -- whilst looking for artificial quinine. In 1863,
Empress Eugenie wore a gown dyed with aldehyde green, which schocked
the Parisian opera-going community since it was the first green which
didn't turn blue in gaslight.  A German chemist named Lucius
discovered aldehyde green earlier that year; he ended up co-founding
Hoechst.

Oh, wait, it looks like this August F. W. Parks fellow started
manufacturing magenta a few years after Perkin, so maybe my guess was
bollocks after all.

http://www.colorantshistory.org/

-anv.