ATDDTA (6) 177(railroads)

[Tore Rye Andersen]

Joseph T (on the positive image of railroads in Lot 49):

>In lot 49  perhaps the railroads may be seen to parallel the  alternate 
>postal system. Once competitive with other forms of  transport  as Thurn 
>and Taxis were with state mail, the rails have  become secondary to 
>Interstates and Air transport and become a kind  of preterite system as Big 
>Oil has become the colonizing and imperial  global force.

This is very good! The railroads - shiny new manifestations of capitalism 
and colonialization in AtD - have by the 1960'es become a battered old 
method of transport for hoboes. The rails have, in a sense, become a 
preterite technology, and the emphasis in both GR and Lot 49 is on those 
bums and Displaced Persons that are transported by this means (see the 
beautiful train song on p. 283 of GR, for instance). It's very fascinating 
to notice how Pynchon elegantly changes his valorization of the railroads in 
accordance with the historical period he's describing.
The question, of course, is what those DPs and hoboes from GR and Lot 49 
would have done if all those railroad engineers had heeded the warning of 
the Tatzelwurm in AtD. The Tatzelwurm, we're told, is sent for a purpose:

"What's that?" Reef said.
"To tell us that we shouldn't be doing this."
"Tunneling?"
"Putting railroads." (AtD, 655)

I guess they would have walked.

_________________________________________________________________
Find dine dokumenter lettere med MSN Toolbar med Windows-pc-søgning:  
http://toolbar.msn.dk