ATDTDA (12): A visitor from quite far away, 337-343 #2

[Paul Nightingale]

Upon meeting Hop Fung, Dally first of all needs Katie as a translator (339);
she misunderstands the 'rules', just as she does a while later when meeting
"restless impresario R Wilshire Vibe" (340). Eventually, she "put[s] on
[her] pith helmet and head[s] across town" to confront him (342), leaving
behind Katie, who has thus far functioned as a kind of mentor. Her irony has
been provoked by Katie's reference to "the cruel jungles of the moneyed
white"; but what she actually finds is vaudeville and "the clangor" of Tin
Pan Alley. RW doesn't appear to be "the marble-halls type"; although the
back-story offered earlier (161) might suggest otherwise, not least the
obvious point that he's not exactly scraping a living here.

Con claims to represent "the true heart of American show business", in
opposition to "light-operatical tycoons" like RW (343); and his attempt to
employ Dally is offered as an attempt to save her from something less
authentic. Cf. as part of RW's back-story: ". fake, or as he preferred,
faux, European operettas on American subjects" (161).

RW has provided funding for increased realism in "the white-slave simulation
industry" (339) and "the expensive make-believe ha[s] somehow slopped over
into 'real life'" (341). Hence the distinction is harder to maintain. To
begin with Dally "ha[s] uptown visitors gaping from their tour charabancs in
amazement, ladies from out of town clutching their hats ." etc (340).
Subsequently, "warnings [are] issued about what parts of Chinatown would be
best avoided unless uptown tourists wished to suffer inconvenience" (341).
Pynchon's regular theme of tourism: and, whereas the Chums are duty-bound to
avoid interfering in local affairs, or at least they are supposed to make
that effort, tourists here in Chinatown cannot avoid participation in that
which they would rather avoid. 

The disruption is caused by new "production money" that is "usually
delivered in the form of gold". This might remind us of Vibean links to
southern Africa, ie Fleetwood's adventures, although one might focus on: ".
exactly the sort of 'unfairly-earned' revenue which sent the Vibe patriarch
into mouth-foaming episodes of unseemly behavior" (167).