The phrase

[Mark Kohut]

just to add to the overtones..........undertones?.........ulvertones?
when I read this paragraph, I thought first, perhaps too literally, of "the Day [of Judgment"]....

one still has a chance in this "penny-foolish world" to "go back" and make amends.....


----- Original Message ----
From: David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>
To: kelber at mindspring.com
Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
Sent: Thursday, January 24, 2008 11:52:05 AM
Subject: Re: The phrase

Oops, let me correct my statement below.  I just re-read the phrase
and saw something I'd missed:

The "Realm of the Penny-foolish and Pound-idiotick" is the same place
as "contrary to Reason," and the logical/reasonable place they are
both opposing is "the Moment they must pass over the Crest of the
Savage Mountain,"  a moment they can pretend won't come.  It is the
"day" they are "against," and this opposition IS "contrary to reason,"
because every moment that passes brings them closer to that point of
no return.  So the two do enhance each other, but "reason" doesn't
mean enlightenment.  It means the logical end of their progression,
that "day."

Pynchon's sentences can be so jumpy!

David Morris

On Jan 24, 2008 10:27 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> More quibbling:
>
> " ... yet, whilst they bide in this Realm of the Penny-foolish and
> Pound-idiotick, till the Moment they must pass over the Crest of the
> Savage Mountain, does their remain to them, contrary to Reason,
> against the Day, a measurable chance, to turn, to go back out of no
> more than Stubbornness, and somehow make all come right ..."
>
> You interpret "contrary to Reason, against the Day" as enhancemants of
> each other, and I disagree.  The "day" is enhanced by what follows it,
> "a measurable chance, to turn, to go back."  That is, a possible time
> in the future which is the opposite of the time mentioned just before,
> " the Moment they must pass over the Crest of the Savage Mountain."
>
> At least that's what makes the most sense to me...  (but I can also
> see it as you do)
>
> David Morris
>
>
> On Jan 24, 2008 10:13 AM,  <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:
> > To quibble further about p. 683:
> >
> > TRP uses the construction: "contrary to Reason, against the Day" then, later in the same sentence: "to turn, to go back"
> >
> > In both cases, the phrase after the comma is a restating (or enhancement) of the first.  Reason: Day, as turn: go back.  Day is akin to enlightenment, directed reasoning.
> >
> > Laura
>


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