ATDTDA (5.1) - The Etienne-Louis Malus

[kelber at mindspring.com]

I guess I meant "America," more than "Americans."  Aside from
Pearl Harbor and 9/11, "America,"  the physical territory, has been peculiarly
distant from the rest of the world.  Not forgetting, of course, all the young Americans
who've gotten blown to bits fighting America's wars, or the millions of 
lives we've destroyed or tainted in real or proxy wars.  But the post 9/11 mentality
is very much concerned with the idea that "we" are no longer immune from
the troubles of the rest of the world.  It reminds me of the post-Vietnam pundits
who kept prattling about how "America" had lost its innocence during the
war.  Talk of recreating history as fiction ...

Laura

-----Original Message-----
>From: Carvill John <johncarvill at hotmail.com>

>
>Laura:
>>I get the feeling that the Chums are stand-ins for "us" -- Americans
as a 
>>whole.

>Not so sure about that one. Pynchon's outlook is very much an international
>one, and attempts to confine him to the subject of America always fall 
>flat...
>
>Cheers
>JC