AtDDtA(15): A Momentary Vision

[Mark Kohut]

Did his voice sound unfamiliar to him because it came thru the "speaking trumpet"?
   
  Using a megaphone makes one's voice unfamiliar to one....
   
  Is not "that Other Promise", the promise of Christianity? Made so long ago.
   
  MK

Dave Monroe <against.the.dave at gmail.com> wrote:
  "Young Meatman seemed mollified. 'You musn't think of it, you
know, as betrayal ... or, not only betrayal.'
"'Oh? what more?'
"He might have hesitated, but not quite long enough to sound
unpracticed. 'The most extraordinary offer of Deliverance to be
tendered us since--that other Promise made so long ago....'
"Chick had a momentary vision of a ship's passageway somewhere,
perhaps inside a giant airship of the future, crowded with resurrected
bodies of all ages [...] --an administrative nightmare largely fallen
to him to resolve. He had a kind of newfangled speaking trumpet in
his hand. 'Has it come to this?' His voice sounded unfamiliar to
him. He could think of nothing further to say. They were all
watching him, expecting something." (AtD, Pt. II, p. 413)


"that other Promise"

"An early prophet of transoceanic telegraphic communication, Alonzo
Jackman, offered a more explicit cultural vision of the salvation of
the world through instantaneous long-disance communication in a 'new
era' of evangelism. 'Heathenism would be entombed, and the whole
earth would be illuminated with the glorious light of Christianity.'"

--Carolyn Marvin, When Old Technologies Were New, p. 192

http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0612&msg=113355


"crowded with resurrected bodies of all ages"

I saw the dead, the great and the lowly, standing before the throne,
and scrolls were opened. Then another scroll was opened, the book of
life. The dead were judged according to their deeds, by what was
written in the scrolls.

The sea gave up its dead; then Death and Hades gave up their dead....

--Revelations 20:12-3

http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/bible/revelation/revelation20.htm

Cf., e.g., ...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d6/MemlingJudgementOpen.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Judgment_(Memling)

As well as ...

"It is too late. The Evacuation still proceeds, but it's all
theatre...." (GR, Pt. I, p. 3)

http://amb.cult.bg/american/6/pynchon/rainbow1.htm

http://www.supportlibrary.com/nl/users/master3/mweb/path21-1.html

"Now everybody--" (GR, Pt. IV, p. 760)

And AtD, Pt. I, pp. 145-55 ...

http://against-the-day.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Against_the_Day_and_September_11


"a kind of newfangled speaking trumpet"

speaking trumpet
Brass forerunner of the megaphone. Abstract of a 1671 paper;

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1671RSPT....6.3056M

photo of a ship's speaking trumpet, 1799;

http://www.nmm.ac.uk/server/show/conMediaFile.2647

catalog entry for a replica American fire brigade speaking trumpet,
mid-19th century.

http://www.auroraregionalfiremuseum.org/giftshop/1850figure/source/horn.htm

http://against-the-day.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=ATD_397-428#Page_413

I was caught up in spirit on the Lord's day and heard behind me a
voice as loud as a trumpet ... --Revelations 1:9

http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/bible/revelation/revelation1.htm

Et soforthiam. But why does his voice "sound unfamiliar to him"? Help!


       
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