ATDTDA (5.1) - The Etienne-Louis Malus

[David Gentle]

> On 3/23/07, Monte Davis <monte.davis at bms.com> wrote:
>> David Morris wrote:
>>
>> The evidence that the CoC exist in the "real" world of AtD is in their 
>> interaction with characters on the ground in Chicago and elsewhere 
>> (Merle, Dahly, Lew, etc.). This needs to be qualified with that line on 
>> p. 36:"...the great national celebration possessed the exact degree of 
>> fictitiousness to permit the boys access and agency.  The harsh 
>> nonfictional world waited outside the White City's limits..."
>>
>> So yes, there's interaction, but only under (un)certain circumstances.
>>
>
> OK, I get your (& Pynchon's) point about the White City's level of
> "fictitiousness," allowing the CoC "access & agency," but it seems a
> statement less about the Chum's existence and more about their nature.
> I mean, how "real" could the talking dog be?  But they do interact
> with "real" (a very relative term for everyone in the book) characters
> in numerous locations besides the White City, in the "harsh
> nonfictional world" (again, in AtD, being a work of fiction, not to be
> taken literally).
>
> David Morris

Perhaps the CoC are some imagining of Dallie's? Chicago is a sort of 
imaginary landscape to her, maybe the chums are part of that landscape. 
Perhaps the book originally started with her and then P. inserted a brief 
imaginary interlude featuring them and then he just sort of kept imagining 
what they would be like separate of her?

David Gentle