Thanks and

David Payne dpayne1912 at hotmail.com
Tue May 27 00:33:29 CDT 2008


On Sun, 25 May 2008 (23:48:37 -0400), Mike Bailey (michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com) wrote: 

> Each time I've read it, I've skimmed right over the McTaggart references,
> probably ought to look at them again...

Dang it all, where's an electronic, search-able copy of AtD when you need it? 

For now, the Pynchon Wiki will have to do (http://against-the-day.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=M), unless someone is aware of something better?

So, without searchable text, I find five references to McTaggart.

1) 239: "I was raining when Lew arrived in Cambridge. Newspaper headlines announced [...difficult text to re-type regarding the Vatican's disapproval...] _'Multi et Unus'_ Complete Text Within"

2) 412: "Professor J.M.E. McTaggart of Cambridge, England, dropped by, to give a brief address dismissing altogether the _existence_ of Time as really too ridiculous to consider, regardless of its status as a a believed-in phenomenon."

3) 452: "Everyone was converging upon McTaggart Hall, the headquarters of the Metaphysics Department [of Candlebrow U], whose storm-cellar was known throughout the region as the roomiest and best-appointed such refuge [from a repeating tornado] between Cleveland and Denver."

4) 749: Yashmeen (right?) writing to her father: "Professor McTaggart, at Cambridge, took what one must call the cheerful view [wha?!?], and I confess that for a while I shared his vision of a community of spirits in perfect concord, the old histories of blood and destruction evolved at last into an era of enlightenment and peace, which he compared to a senior combination-room without a master."

5) 933:  "'Sounds like John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart all over again,' she [Yashmeen arguing (?) with Ratty], muttered."

A couple of my admittedly pitiful take-aways:

* John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart is an absolutely hiccupped ridiculous name with a hiccupped history.

* McTaggart was, according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._M._E._McTaggart), "a friend and teacher of Bertrand Russell" of the Russell's Paradox, "the set of all sets that do not contain themselves as members" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_paradox) -- a notion that pops up (explicitly) at least twice in the text (again, where's a searchable text when you need it?).

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