Atdtda23: [46.1i] A passionate heart, 653

[David Morris]

In AtD the ambiguity of the nature and origin of threats (or are they
gifts?) abound:  Are the"Visitors" ... ? ... well ... SO many
questions about them.  I think the same is true about the object
beneath the snow.  Many of the expedition intuited that it was
potentially dangerous, but they took it anyway.  Did it lure them
(hypnotize) them to do so?  Or was their greed enough to overcome
their fear?  Or both?

Monte's take on the Old Ones stuff in Lovecraft (which I've not read)
being beyond good or evil makes sense to me, and in that case it may
be the "natural Vs foreign" take is insignificant because it works
either way. The message is that the SCALE of the objects significance
is beyond our comprehension (and maybe humility would be in order).

Pynchon has been their before with his invocation of Rilke's gigantic
angels in GR (also in AtD, if I remember).

David Morris

On Dec 14, 2007 11:22 AM, Monte Davis <monte.davis at verizon.net> wrote:
>
>  Laura sez:
> > In 2001, the object was deliberately placed.  Pynchon's is a natural, indigenous object -- very different.
>
> The description is ambiguous. All the strokes tending toward tomb, burial, sculpture are qualified with "as if," but it's also set up as seeming like a _nunatak_ (a projection of bedrock through the ice) but not being one.
>
> I'd extend the ambiguity to "malevolence," here and in Lovecraft's ancient artifacts. Yes, in Lovecraft everything pertaining to the Old Ones, Elder Gods etc has evil effects on people. But part of his power is the simultaneous hint that they're "beyond good and evil" -- i.e., any contact opens up vistas so ancient and immense as to drive us mad, simply because we are so insignificant on that scale.