TMoP, Chapter 17

[Richard Ryan]

In some ways the most "Christian" of the chapters - Matryona's revelation that she may have (and certainly intended) to poison the Finn suggests a human nature permeated by original sin: the sins, hatreds, and obsessions of the parents visited upon and sustained by the children.


--- On Wed, 11/19/08, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:

> From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: TMoP, Chapter 17
> To: "pynchon -l" <pynchon-l at waste.org>, "Lawrence Bryan" <lebryan at speakeasy.net>
> Date: Wednesday, November 19, 2008, 2:16 PM
> "the death of innocence, D. thinks.......reminds me
> that dostoevsky felt
> cruelly hurting a child was (almost) the unforgiveable
> sin.......
> Was the test of God, a just God. the existence
> of.............
> 
> he feels alone on a vast plain........
> 
> and the gun is seen and remains.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --- On Mon, 11/17/08, Lawrence Bryan
> <lebryan at speakeasy.net> wrote:
> 
> > From: Lawrence Bryan <lebryan at speakeasy.net>
> > Subject: Re: TMoP, Chapter 17
> > To: "pynchon -l" <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> > Date: Monday, November 17, 2008, 9:30 PM
> > More gnashing of teeth and Prufrockian dithering. He
> wants
> > to go home but has no passport and no money. Thwarted
> by the
> > police bureaucracy, by no reply from his benefactor,
> Maykov,
> > and at the end of the chapter by a small piece of ice
> that
> > catches a missile aimed at the running water next to
> it, he
> > continues to stumble about.
> > 
> > The bulk of the chapter is a scene with Matryona in
> which
> > he discovers that Nechaev has spun his web (through
> Pavel?)
> > as far as the child. She dutifully carries out her
> > assignment to surreptitiously provide poison to the
> Finn
> > when the police brought her by in a previous chapter. 
> Was
> > the small sack of poison Pavel's? Did he share the
> use
> > of it with Matryona or did Nechaev? Did Pavel have a
> sack
> > around his neck when he was found? If the police found
> it
> > would they have mentioned it to Dostoevsky? If it
> wasn't
> > there was it because Pavel didn't have one or was
> it
> > because he really was murdered and by Nechaev or his
> gang
> > and the sack was removed. Coetzee doesn't reveal
> any
> > interest on Dostoevsky's part to find out.
> > 
> > Lawrence