ATDTDA (13): Heh, heh, heh, 351-353 #1

[Paul Nightingale]

Dally's "now-battered copy of Dishforth's Illustrated Weekly" made its first
appearance back on 75 when Merle sacrifices the "Cuban panatela he was
fixing to smoke and settle[s] for a three-cent domestic instead". He gives
the magazine to Dally "and though he never saw it again he understood she's
put [it] away safely among her possessions" (76). Perused countless times
since then the magazine is reminiscent of Veikko's postcard (84).

Casa Zombini resembles both its own photo-image, there for all to see, and
also its Italian prototype, the latter fact a more specialised knowledge.
Possibly a similar point might be made regarding Dally's various
half-siblings (whom the text, adopting Dally's pov perhaps, refers to as
"stepbrothers and sisters", 352): Dally is the 'original' offspring, the
other children imitations of a kind, repetitions even. An overview (eg ".
sitting together peacefully on a Sunday morning ." etc) is juxtaposed to an
account of specific (one-off) scenes, eg the coin trick.