AtDTDA (43)---Inside the transmission shack 950/951

[robinlandseadel at comcast.net]

In Gravity's Rainbow film is a near constant reference point. Film in 1945 was 
cutting edge technology, an alchemical hybrid of science and the arts. During 
the wobbly time frame of Against the Day we are presented with a number of brand 
spanking new thermionic and purely acoustic devices designed for sound. 
These are cutting edge designs---in their respective time-frames. Many people 
have already noted that Pynchon shows us a myriad of paths not taken in Against 
the Day. A lot of those paths are very early developments that eventually turn 
into Television. And as anybody who was paying attention while reading Vineland 
knows, OBA knows TV.

Audio recording and the development of the first electronic amplifiers have 
a parallel development with the rise of the paranormal in the Late 
Victorian/Edwardian era. All those-table tappers, palm readers, Tarot 
diviners and crystal ball scryers must have experienced a bump in their 
respective trades when Edison's cylinders arrived on the scene. Simply 
hearing the sound of someone now deceased---who does not know the 
sound of Thomas Edison reciting "Mary Had a Little Lamb?":

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10137

. . . .gives one the sense that the dead are among us.That 'sensitive 
flame' vibe of the seance is evoked in so much of popular culture, 
films, television shows, couture trends like Goth. It's funny how strong that 
particular vibe/meme is--the Scryess and the candle-lit room gets to sit at the 
head of the table in pop culture, boffo B.O. in "Ghost", "Practical Magic', 
"Edward Scissorhands","The Craft" and hosts of films even worse.  
Sylvia Browne and John Edwards also cash in on the chuthonic vibe. The 
look and feel of Hammer Horror films of the 50's/60's gets refined into the pop 
phenomenon of Harry Potter. And here we have the Chums of Chance and 
Chunxton Crescent---certainly "Potteresque."

Earlier in the book we note that Madame Eskimoff records her seances 
using a Parsons-Short Auxetophone, a rather exotic name for a 
gaslight era state-of-the-art record player. The primary virtue of the 
Parsons-Short Auxetophone is the ability to play loud. Of course, if one wants 
to hear low-level sonic 'accidents' [as in "there are no"] a Parsons-Short 
Auxetophone is just the thing. What is interesting to note---the Parsons-Short 
Auxetophone is an acoustic player. It is the technological peak of yet another 
audio medium that became obsolete. Mind you, I've run into a number of 
psychics who point to the polluting effects of all that electricity we play 
with. 

Not to mention an audio engineer or two.

So here, inside the transmission shack, we are presented with yet another 
electro/spiritual-acoustic cul-de-sac [Xenakis, anyone?]---an amplifier of the 
ghosts in our machines, a useful tool for glossolalic transcribers like Orson 
Welles, Glenn Gould and Robert Altman. 

          "It's all right," said one of the operators. "Many in the field 
          believe that these are voices of the dead. Edison and 
          Marconi both feel that the syntonic wireless can be 
          developed as a way to communicate with departed spirits."
          
Reef remembers Webb and the next sound we hear is an explosion of Motorcycles. 
Then there's the arrival of an operator dealing with shifting alliances. This 
part of the world is getting closer to anarchy all the time. Recall the spas, 
hotspots and gutters Slothrop traveled through, those old Transylvanian 
routes and how they sometimes overlap with the paths of our jolly crew here 
in Bulgaria. Note, once again, how anarchy rubs up against the pagan, like 
the Panic movement. Not in any cause/effect manner, but in the simple fact 
of being on the same page [literally.]