Help, please

[Natália Maranca]

Oh well, then I prefer your syntactical explanation.

On Tue, Nov 11, 2008 at 8:26 PM, David Payne <dpayne1912 at hotmail.com> wrote:

>  Note that I prefer Heikki's reading of this passage. I wasn't trying to
> disagree with Heikki's reading -- more trying to parse out the direct and
> indirect objects of various phrases in the sentence...
>
> > From: dpayne1912 at hotmail.com
> > To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> > Subject: RE: Help, please
> > Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 22:11:13 +0000
>
> >
> >
> > That sentence is so screwy that I cannot determine the object of each
> phrase ... does this seem close to correct?
> >
> > * "Cammed each night out of that safe furrow" -- i.e., the old man is
> cammed out (pushed out by his own energies which are redirected vertically)
> of that safe furrow (i.e., the straight & narrow path of life) each night?
> >
> > * as opposed to (camming requires oppositive forces): "the bulk of this
> city's waking each sunrise again set virtuously to plowing" -- i.e., most of
> the people in the city wake up each morning to dutifully plow along the
> straight and narrow life ("the bulk" have sufficient mass to overcome the
> counter pressure of the old man, so he is cammed out of the safe furrow)
> >
> > * and back to the old man: "what rich soils had he turned, what
> concentric planets uncovered?" -- i.e., "she" (Oedipa) is wondering what the
> old man turned up during his evening plowing, which was conducted along a
> different furrow than the safe furrow that the bulk of the city woke to do?
> (i.e., what poetic truths have been unearthed by this old man's shadowy,
> counter-culture living)
> >
> > The old man is against the day, so to speak, but one against the bulk is
> beaten down?
> >
> > > Natália Maranca wrote:
> > >>I'm reading CofL49 and it was a very smooth read
> > >>so far, but now I'm stuck in this bit. I'm not a
> > >>native speaker, so be condescendent.
> > >>It is on p. 102 in my Harper Perennial edition.
> > >>She is hallucinating all over San Francisco and
> > >>in the dawn she meets this old man who asks her
> > >>to drop a letter to his wife under the freeway, in the W.A.S.T.E. box.
> > >>' "Under the freeway." He waved her on the
> > >>direction she'd been going. "Always one. You'll
> > >>see it." The eyes closed. Cammed each night out
> > >>of that safe furrow the bulk of this city's
> > >>waking each sunrise again set virtuously to
> > >>plowing, what rich soils had he turned, what concentric planets
> uncovered?"
> > >>This is absolutely incomprehensible to me. I
> > >>loose the line of thought there and everything
> > >>he says after doesn't seem to make much sense.
> > >>Can anyone please explain it to me?
> > >
> > >
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