Bianca
Ray Easton
kraimie at kraimie.net
Thu Nov 9 13:56:43 CST 2006
On Thursday, Nov 9, 2006, at 09:01 US/Central, Monte Davis wrote:
> What is pervasive in Pynchon, and *meant* to provoke the unease you're
> feeling, is the insistence that the erotic and sexual moments -- the
> moments when you would be most unguarded, most yourself, most open to
> another, most free of "public" social roles and expectations -- are
> precisely the moments when Powers you'd rather not think about --
> within and
> without -- may be most busily at work. (cf. Plato, Choderlos de Laclos,
> Freud, Plath, Norman O. Brown, Foucault, Sappho, Mailer, any random
> bodice-ripper or Mike Hammer novel, _passim_).
Let me ask you a slightly different question than the one I previously
posed to the list: what is there *in the text itself* that leads you
to conclude that the Slothrup and Bianca episode is an instance of
"control"?
I agree that the theme you state is pervasive in GR. I agree with your
analysis in the other instances you cite. But I fail to see in the
text any suggestion that that is what is happening in the case of
Slothrup and Bianca. Could you enlighten me? (That is *not* intended
sarcastically.)
R.
More information about the Pynchon-l
mailing list