ATDTDA On Pearl Street, twangs of conscience

[mikebailey at speakeasy.net]

> This section (bottom of p. 331 and on) is a weak point of the book, IMO. Vibe and Walker sitting
> around, kind of gleefully rubbing their hands ( a la the Simpsons' Montomery Burns) OPENLY
> admitting the conspiracy, more or less admitting to the murder of the elder Traverse. As a
> Pynchon fan, I like my conspiracies hinted at or implied, whether by glance or grafitti. Spelled
> out and over-exposited (expositioned?), it comes across as cheap melodramatics.
>

true, uniquely-P wordplay and poetics are at a minimum here

I think Vibe's language is drawn from authentic
xenophobic and racist source documents.
Vibe and Walker are alone, electronic bugs haven't been
invented yet...
Nixon in the Oval Office vented and spewed thus, even while
aware of surveillance, so it's not like completely implausible...

Vibe's candor is particularly unattractive.

Who hasn't dreamed of being a stupendous badass?  In Vibe's
chair, I'd order Webb dispatched without a 2nd thought,
and serve it up to Kit in a way he'd swallow with relish.

The thing is, though, Vibe doesn't really have the skills;

Foley Walker now, whose scene this really is, to the extent of
our sharing his foreboding dream and getting to know his 
voices a little better - or, I guess, the interplay between
FW and SV and their different interpretations of the Christian
aegis they militate under...

(at least, I think that's what SV means, the "mighty...wings
we shelter beneath" (splitting an infinitive) -- or is he
hinting at a temporal conspiracy, ie Them? -- here's your
hint of conspiracy, maybe...if Vibe isn't the eye atop the
pyramid, then who is?)

...anyway, the interplay between SV and FW, like that between
Brock Vond and Roscoe in _Vineland_, allows for candor that
reveals SV's depths, unattractive as they are; and shows the
beginning of a breach between the two men - not to mention
Walker's perhaps even more loony guidance by voices and
the fact that he's had a hidden agenda all along.

But, I gotta agree, I like the pizza scene with 
Vanderjuice better.