ATDTDA (3) Dynamitic mania, 80-86

[Tore Rye Andersen]

Joseph T wrote:

>I think what is being explored here is the magnetic attraction of
>power and its promises of protection, lines of order, clear roles,
>leaders chosen by destiny or God, manly uniforms . The difference I
>see between Lake and Frenesi is that Frenesi is much more conscious,
>much more complicated when she is initially seduced by Vond.

I fully agree about the difference between Lake and Frenesi. Lake seems but 
a pale reflection of the complicated Frenesi (who IMO is one of Pynchon's 
best characters). Lake is never really developed as a character, and as a 
consequence her weird choice of husband doesn't hit the reader (at least 
this reader) as hard as I believe it was intended to. Frenesi's choice, on 
the other hand, was a real smack in the gob.

And David Morris wrote:

>[Lake] is the unfathomable one, much like Frenesi in VL.
>Neither one makes much sense to me.  I think they both have something
>to do with Pynchon's view of Women.  I can't say I understand the
>message, but I do think it has something to do with a Woman's place in
>relation to a world power structure owned by men.

They're certainly both very troubling figures (especially Frenesi, since she 
is much more developed as a character). I'm not sure that I completely agree 
that they have something to do with Pynchon's view of Women in general: 
There are plenty of strong, independent women in his fiction who behave 
differently than Frenesi and Lake (Oedipa Maas, Geli Tripping, Leni Pökler, 
DL Chastain), but that doesn't make the behaviour of Lake and Frenesi less 
disturbing, of course. I think it's right to argue, though, that with these 
two particular femme fatales Pynchon probes a certain more or less universal 
problematics of power. Brock Vond's nasty comments to Frenesi certainly 
point us in that general direction:

"You're the medium Weed and I use to communicate, that's all, this set of 
holes, pleasantly framed, this little femme scampering back and forth with 
scented messages tucked in her little secret places."
She was too young then to understand what he thought he was offering her, a 
secret about power in the world. That's what he thought it was. Brock was 
young then too." (VL, 214)

Even though the narrator undercuts Brock's theory, both Brock and Frenesi 
act as if it were true. Brock's comments may not exactly be "a secret about 
power in the world", but they certainly reflect a certain dream of power 
that can be identified in many of Pynchon's characters. And in fact this 
desire to be taken, to submit oneself to something powerful, whether it be a 
uniform, a giant black ape, Destiny, or a little prick like Brock Vond, 
doesn't limit itself to the women of Pynchon's fiction. Franz Pökler in GR 
exhibits the same desire to be taken, to be relieved from taking 
responsibility for his own life, to submit himself to Destiny, or to Leni:

"Franz, in play, often called her "Lenin." There was never doubt about who 
was active, who passive - still she had hoped he'd grow beyond it. She has 
talked to psychiatrists, she knows about the German male at puberty. On 
their backs in the meadows and mountains, watching the sky, masturbating, 
yearning. Destiny waits, a darkness latent in the texture of the summer 
wind." (GR, 162)

In the 'relationship' between Katje and Pudding, Katje is also the dominant 
part, to put it mildly. And Cyprian Latewood in AtD flirts with the same 
passivity that Franz and Pudding long for (and in the triangle with Yashmeen 
and Reef he even becomes a medium between Yash and Reef, in much the same 
way that Frenesi was a medium between Weed and Brock). In the end he joins a 
monastery and becomes a nun, which can both be construed as Cyprian finally 
taking full control of his own life AND as Cyprian finally submitting 
himself completely to a higher power.
Frenesi, and to a less extent Lake, act out this same fantasy of being 
taken, of remaining children forever, of living in a world without 
consequences, and Pynchon's novels are full of characters who share this 
fantasy, including DL and Prairie in VL. Even though they flirt with the 
fantasy (DL begs Sister Rochelle to relieve her of responsibility of the 
mess she's made with Takeshi, Prairie kinda wishes Brock Vond would come 
back and take her), in the end they resist the more or less universal 
temptation to submit themselves - a temptation that is so universal that it 
doesn't limit itself to women.

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