ATDTDA (18): 493-494 "captivated by eyes"

[Mark Kohut]

David,
   
  Very strong case made...maybe you are fully right...I'm rereading (again) and letting it all get more internalized and see anew.
   
  I agree on ideal anarchist community obs.
   
  For precison's sake, I was wrong to set "non-genital' against 
  whole body', of course.....Brown wanted to abolish the distinction to some degree. yes?
  No "either/or' but a non-repressive polymorphousness?......a full "range" in an ArD sense
  (and part of your argument, yes?)
   
  And yes, Brown for non-repressive vs. Freud's 'degradation of the erotic life".
   
  And, yes, we--at least I, it seems--must sort out the pleasure-loving hedonism vs. decadence in TRPs vision, as Ms. Kelber challenged. 
   
  But, a lot of the sex in TRP IS decadent and is a metaphor for what is wrong with the world we know, agreed? Laura is right on Slothrop and I might argue even more of it ....ain't ideal.
  (All---since it is so Pavlovian?)....R, Mexico is "in love" at least as is(for awhile, maybe?) his otherwise bethrothed.
   
  I still neeed convincing that some of the origins of Cyprian's desire--and Yashmeen's---is far from ideal. It is hard for me to ground an "ideal, unique 3-way marriage" in a (largely) gay guy who is turned on just by a woman's voice and her 'turning away', her willful DISINTEREST....
   
  More on "the Gaze' to come....
   
  Yours in Dialogue,
  MK
   
  

David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
  N.O. Browns acceptance (as opposed to Freud's "perversity" label) of
polymorphous (infantile, only because it is pre-repression) sexuality
is not, as you label it "non-genital." But it is "whole-body." And I
think his point is about trying to return to a pre-repression state,
before the "No!" Or it is at least an (hopeful) exploration about
whether such a return is possible. For Brown (as I see it), his
dilemma with Freud was whether neurosis/repression is an irredeemable
condition, either poorly or acceptably mediated in everyday life. I
don't think Brown ever comes to a definitive conclusion over the
trilogy of his explorations of the subject, but the books are well
worth reading.

The 3-way marriage seems to me a idyllic presentation (just as
Pynchon's anarchist's village is shown as an idyllic hope), producing
a miracle baby (Ljubica - From the Slavic element "lub" meaning "love"
combined with a diminutive suffix), the product of a three-way love
making - significantly directed by the female and provoking in all
partners an expansion in their realms of sexual pleasure. So I don't
agree that it is presented as a "falling away" as "V" portrays. It
isn't "modern" either, unless one considers a liberated female
"modern." I think your reference to the white goddess shows just the
opposite.

David Morris

On 9/27/07, Mark Kohut wrote:
> David,
>
> I'm going to offer/expand some difference of opinion..... Venus comparison seems like a great found allusion, thanks to whomever...
>
> But....is not N.O.Brown's concept of polymorphous perversity in infantile sexuality about non-genital "sex/sensuality", pure whole body natural 'delight'?....in being fully alive in all the senses, so to speak?
>
> I might want to argue that the 3-way "marriage" in this section is presented by TRP as a falling away from whatever real Love is/was?.....(as "V." , who might also be Venus, the Virgin et al, has greatly fallen away from the original (positive) meanings in V.?)
>
> Maybe, I am floundering to express, this is TRP's take on all of the new sexual 'choices' that the modern world started to offer?...Particularly offer women, the feminine principle, the "white goddesses"?....


       
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