ATDDTA: Picking Finland

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

           bekah
           Do you consider Sibelius, Saarinen or Linus Torvalds,  
           to be "other"  and "preterite?" 

The only one of the three I know is Sibelius. I guess It's either the Fourth 
Symphony or Tapiola that are my favorite of his works. Many of the 
fantasies I have concerning Finland comes from playing those pieces 
over and over, with their haunting evocations of haunted landscapes. Of 
course Sibelius is welcome in the great concert halls of the world, he is 
among the elect in that regard. But the idea at the center of Tapiola, that 
of an older, colder and meaner cousin of Gaia, there's a bit of heresy, 
that kind of talk'll get you kicked out of the ministry muy pronto, ain't no 
way to square that with the "Unitary Godhead" approach everybody else 
believes rules the universe. "Tapiola" represents old magic.

           Why does what you said sound racist?

Perhaps, on some level, it was. Perhaps, in my exaggerations (14th 
century or so? I stand corrected. So the whole country was wired up 
into those belief systems, all at once, as if someone pulled a switch 
and ---voila!!!) the degree of difference was brought into relief. I'm not 
denying that Christianity became the local dominant religious paradigm. 
I am noting that much of Finland's culture and many traditions were 
retained, probably on account of limited outside interference. Of course, 
in the era of the novel, any degree of exaggeration of cultural difference 
would be employed. 

I hope I didn't offend you, that was not my intent or desire. I simply note some
threads I've been following all along within Pynchon's writing, and I'm applying 
those thoughts to your question. Race, cultural inheritance and demarcation of 
hierarchical order are central topics here. These notions of inheritance and 
dis-inheritance, boundary lines and other sides of tracks, they matter as much 
in AtD as anywhere else in Pynchon's writing.

And I find your post on the Tibetan connection very interesting.