TMOP: Chapter 8 - Ivanov

[richardryannyc at yahoo.com]

First, kudos, again to Bekah on her excellent glosses....

About the "Ivanov" chapter - there's a tone that's set in this episode which grates against my grain - I'll try to remember to come back to this when we get to "The Shot Tower" - but it's a tone of self-conscious parody. I find that this chapter feels too arch, too much a knowing pastiche of Dostoevsky's style, themes,, authorial mannerisms.  It's a bit of a bravura performance...one is (I am) constantly aware of how well Coetzee writes.  But it doesn't convince or move me.  This stilted quality may actually be one of Coetzee's points - the tendency of art and artifice to get in the way of life...
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-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>

Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2008 10:38:22 
To: Bekah<Bekah0176 at sbcglobal.net>
Cc: pynchon -l<pynchon-l at waste.org>
Subject: Re: TMOP: Chapter 8 - Ivanov


More on Ivanov. Some 'airship'--overview--speculations.
D. here is crazed at least. Maybe a bit 'crazy' [defined as out of reality
at times]. 

The real but also symbolic dog, as Bekah teaches us. Dogs: perhaps the animal most like a human--man's best friend?. Most socialized. Yet, more dependent, most vulnerable? Here, like an impoverished young Russian?

Is the dog as D. sees him, D.'s way of seeing the deepest injustice of 
Russian society?..Scraggling, hungry, vulnerable, dependent dogs?

Churchill once called his (clinical) depression, a Black Dog. Here, like death, like dead Pavel? Intertwining with D. (who we see here, per Bekah, as more like Coetzee grapping with layers of confused grief than like the Dostevsky of reality).

Ivanov is the intersection? He is real (outside this book) but what happens to him in it--and in history--is in doubt? 

D. as Coetzee ingesting all this? The meaning of the dog, Ivanov, D.s actions?



--- On Sat, 10/11/08, Bekah <Bekah0176 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

> From: Bekah <Bekah0176 at sbcglobal.net>
> Subject: TMOP: Chapter 8 - Ivanov
> To: "pynchon -l" <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Date: Saturday, October 11, 2008, 1:54 AM
> Last host-post from me:
> 
> 
> Chapter 8 - Ivanov
> 
> This is a really difficult chapter with the pronouns
> messing with an  
> already complex message.  Ambiguous or unclear or something
> (not to  
> disparage ambiguous - there are times when it adds a
> certain element  
> of the unknown or the idea that both (or more)  meanings
> could be true.
> 
> 
> [ Page 79  D. goes to sleep seeking Pavel but is disturbed
> by a voice  
> calling to him.  He goes out and finds it is a dog. ]
> 
> As I mentioned earlier,  dogs are important in Coetzee and
> I think  
> this one is very symbolic.
> 
> 
> [ Page 80  * The dog is not Pavel and it continues to howl.
>   D.  
> knows he  must not go back to bed because  his son will be
> like a  
> "thief in the night" so D.  must expect what he
> does not expect.   
> (But expecting it could nullify it.)
> 
> *   "like a thief in the night"  is a Biblical
> phrase,  2 Peter  
> 3:10,  1 Thesselonians 5:2  generally simply means someone
> (Christ)  
> will arrive without any announcement - unexpectedly -   D.
> was very  
> religious so his thinking in Biblical terms is very
> realistic.
> 
> 
> [  D. finds the dog tied and tangled with chain to a
> drainpipe.  It  
> whines.]
> 
> The dog is trapped like  Coetzee and Dostoevsky are in
> their writing  
> (tied to cultural barriers and getting twisted around their
> own  
> thinking - Coetzee writes about the barriers of South
> African  
> apartheid  a fair bit.)  Or the dog may be trapped like
> Pavel is in  
> death.  - Both?
> 
> ***************
> [ Page 81    The dog is terrified. D. tickles it.  "Is
> this what I  
> will be doing for the rest of my days, he wonders: peering
> into the  
> eyes of dogs and beggars?"   D. untangles the dog,
> pets him and  
> leaves him chained there.   He wonders about the owners -
> and thinks  
> that Pavel should have his own death,  that D. has no right
> to use it  
> as the occasion of his reformation. ]
> 
> * Love that line and thought
> 
> [  But he's kidding himself - "Pavel's death
> will always be his   
> death."  ]
> 
> Pavel's death is D.'s death.
> 
> [  " 'Who will save the baby?' he seems to
> hear within him, plaintive  
> words that come from he does not know where, in a
> peasant's singsong  
> voice." ]
> 
> And "peasant voices,"  for Dostoevsky, are often
> authentic voices,   
> especially when they are used in religion or religious
> themes - life  
> and death. ]
> 
> 
> [  D. carries Pavel like a dying baby, blue with cold. ]
> 
> * So is it,  "Who will save Pavel?"  Or who will
> save Sophia, his  
> infant daughter who probably died only a few months prior
> to this -  
> if Dostoevsky's chronology is followed.
> 
> [ " ' Raise up that last thing and cherish
> it.'  D. thinks this but  
> doesn't know if the words come from Pavel or not.   ]
> 
>   *   "The least thing" could be Biblical again: 
>  Matthew 25: 40 -  
> "And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to
> you, as you did it  
> to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to
> me.’     
> Sounds about right for Dostoevsky in his religious mind.
> 
> So who went out to answer the dog's call?   Pavel in
> D's body?  Have  
> we strayed into the occult here?
> 
> ****************
> [ Page 82   If Pavel did utter those words,  should he go
> back and  
> release the dog?   Or is it the beggar who is least and
> needs to be  
> released?  He feels totally hopeless but he knows he will
> never again  
> go out in the night to answer a dog's call.   "I
> am I," he thinks  
> despairingly.
> 
> [ D.  tries to argue that the dog is not his son but he
> loses -  
> "Pavel will not be saved till he has freed the dog and
> brought it  
> into his bed, brought the least thing, the beggarmen and
> the  
> beggarwomen too, and much else he does not yet know
> of..."
> 
> * This seems like some kind of religious contract which D.
> is trying  
> to bargain with God.    Bargaining is part of the grief
> process.  So  
> is guilt - I think  D. feels very, very guilty for the way 
> he  
> neglected Pavel and was harsh on him.
> 
> [  D. says he seeks the truth but realizes that the truth
> has been  
> pouring down on him and he is drowning in it yet he wants
> more -  
> reverse and reverse the reversal - a Jesuitical trick?]
> *  This one is more like the Epilogue of The Brothers
> Karamazov when  
> Alyosha has to admit that his thinking about escape and
> forgiveness  
> is like the lie becoming the truth - Jesuitical conundrums
> and  
> equivocation - tricks.
> 
> * D. has twisted himself around his tether just like the
> dog.
> 
> 
> 
> [ D. is standing in the street - his hands smell like dog,
> his tears  
> like salt. "Salt, for those who need salt."   
> And D. tries to  
> determine whether a thing is a thing or the thing is a sign
> and knows  
> that kind of thinking will defeat him.   "And beware,
> beware, he  
> reminds himself: the dog on the chain, the second dog, is
> nothing in  
> itself, is not an illumination, merely an animal
> likeness!"
> 
> *   This "salt of the earth" stuff is from the
> Bible again - Matthew  
> (again) 5:13 - Sermon on the Mount - and  probably an
> allusion to  
> peasants.  Dostoevsky loved the Russian peasant
> religiosity.
> 
> Very strange find:   http://marinablack.visualserver.com/ 
> Portfolio_main.cfm?nk=5421&nS=0&i=
> 
> 
> > They asked, "Why have you taken them? Was there a
> reason since  
> > you've never liked to collect them; you've
> always liked to look at  
> > them and sometimes leaf'd them through your
> fingers?" then I, "I  
> > should not have done it; I did not want to, no!"
> and I again, "Is  
> > someone knocking at the door? Listen? - A dog is
> howling; I smell  
> > the dog on my hands and the salt for those who need
> salt!" and then  
> > they, "The dog is not a sign, it is just a dog
> among many dogs  
> > howling in the night. So, what about them? Why have
> you taken them  
> > now?"
> 
> 
> [ Meanwhile,  is someone watching him from the doorway?  ]
> 
> ***************
> 
> Page 84
> 
> [ His imagination is full of bearded men with glittering
> eyes who  
> hide din the dark passages.  but he senses another
> presence.  Sees a  
> man crouched.  ]
> 
> Suspicion again - it's always there in this book -
> something  
> lurking,  spying - from Maximov to D. himself, the ultimate
>  
> cannibalistic voyeur,  to Nechaev.
> 
> [   " Expect the one you do not expect.  Very well;
> but must every  
> beggar then be treated as a prodigal son, embraced,
> welcomed into the  
> home, feasted?  Yes, that is what Pascal would say: bet on
> everyone,  
> every beggar, every mangy dog; only thus will you be sure
> that the  
> One, the true son, the thief in the night, will not sip
> through the  
> net."   ]
> 
> *  Prodigal son parable from the Bible - Luke 15: 11-32. -
> 
> The Gospel of Luke is also used for the whole idea of
> demons in Demons -
> 
> "The facts have shown us that the illness that seized
> civilized  
> Russians was much stronger than we ourselves imagined, and
> that the  
> matter did not end with Belinsky, Kraevsky, etc. But what
> occurred  
> here is what is witnessed to by the evangelist Luke.
> Exactly the same  
> thing happened with us: the demons came out of the Russian
> man and  
> entered into a herd of swine, i.e. into the Nechaevs
> [Russian  
> terrorists] . . ."
> 
> That's from a letter from Dostoevsky to Maykov about
> his ideas for  
> "Demons."
> 
> http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jim_forest/pevear.htm
> 
> *  Pascal -  Pascal's Wager -  "If you believe in
> God and turn out to  
> be incorrect, you have lost nothing -- but if you don't
> believe in  
> God and turn out to be incorrect, you will go to hell.
> Therefore it  
> is foolish to be an atheist."
> 
> **********
> 
>   [ Page 85 -  Is betting on all the numbers still
> gambling?  And a  
> paragraph about the wife who  pawns her wedding ring for
> money for  
> the gambler who loses it so the wife goes out to pawn the
> wedding  
> dress.  ]
> 
> [ This is straight from Dostoevsky's life during the
> years in Europe  
> when Dostoevsky was down to pawning his wife's jewelry,
> including the  
> wedding ring,  to get himself out of gambling troubles and
> he went  
> straight to the card table with hit.)
> 
> http://www.dartmouth.edu/~karamazo/bio08.html
> 
> http://www.nplusonemag.com/gambling-supplement
> 
> [ D. compares "giving it all" to Anna, the
> landlady, and her love  
> making.  Is that an indicator of how she will give herself
> to the god  
> of chance? ]
> 
> But perhaps there's also a Biblical connection  to the
> parable of the  
> widow's mite?  Mark 12:38-44  ]
> 
> * And D. remembers and thinks,  "She, he thinks: she
> is the one, it  
> is she whom I want.  Therefore..."
> 
> **********
> 
> Page 86
> 
> [ And thinking this about Anna -  D. goes back downstairs
> and offers  
> his bed to the beggar.]
> 
> D. is figuring he has to give his all to redeem Pavel? 
> Like he's  
> pawned him?  Or he's what???  I don't see the
> logical connection but  
> perhaps its just about action?  Just give it - cover the
> bases - play  
> a Pascal.   Will Anna appreciate D's giving his bed to
> a bum?  -
> 
> [ the beggar says:  " ' This is my post, I must
> stay at my post.' "  
> But they get upstairs and the beggar introduces himself as
> Ivan Pyotr  
> Alexandrovich.
> 
> This is apparently the fictionalization of I.I. Ivanov the
> historical  
> victim of Necheav and People's Vengeance.   Dostoevsky
> used Ivanov in  
> Demons under the name Ivan Shatov.   This scene of Ivanov
> changing  
> his mind about accepting D.'s offer of his room may
> symbolize  
> Ivanov's change of heart about the "People's
> Revenge" group.    (not  
> to go further due to spoilers)
> 
> See - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Nechayev
> 
> ***********
> [ Page 87  Ivan advises D. to cry for his lost son. 
> "We must learn  
> to cry from the fair sex, Fyodor Mikhailovich."  Ivan
> cries.  " 'I  
> believe I will grieve for my lost babies for the rest of my
> days,'   
> he says." ]
> 
>   D. earlier thought of Pavel as a cold dying baby in his
> arms.
> 
> ************
> [  Page 88  D wonders if people tell him their stories
> because he is  
> a writer.  Ivanov talks to him about charity and grief and
> God.  D.  
> thinks Ivan a charlatan and they sleep.
> 
> * Ivan's name changes on this page - Ivan Pyotr
> Alexandrovich becomes  
> Ivanov as in I.I.  I don't know enough about Russian
> naming to know why.
> 
> [  D. wakes him up and says,  "Time to leave, your
> shift is over."    
> Ivanov doesn't notice the irony. }
> 
> * Another ambiguity, imo, does D. suspect anything - what?
> 
> ************
> 
> [  Page 89   Ivanov cadges breakfast and comments,   
> "We get what we  
> deserve, in a higher sense.  Nevertheless I sometimes
> wonder, do we  
> not also deserve, each of us, a refuge, a haven, where
> justice will  
> for a while relent and pity be taken on us? -  spirit of
> Scripture:   
> That we deserve what we do not deserve?
> 
> * Ivanov wants to stay,  rambles - tries to get D. into a  
> philosophical discussion.  D. has to almost kick him out.
> 
> *********
> 
> [  Page 90    A fat young girl dressed like a nun novice
> comes to  
> D.'s door.   She says she's a friend of Pavel's
> and wants to see what  
> he left behind.   She has called before but the landlady
> wouldn't  
> admit her. She says her name is Katri - a Finnish name.  
> "She looks  
> like a Finn, too."  ]
> 
> * Finland was an technically an autonomous Grand Duchy of
> Russia from  
> 1819.  They experienced a severe famine between 1866- 1868
> - I'm told  
> that my ancestors had to cook and eat the bark from the
> trees.  -  
> There was probably quite a lot of immigration during that
> time.   
> Petersburg is quite close.  There were no political
> ramifications to  
> the famine - not political blame or uprisings. 
> Historically,  this  
> girl would have come to Petersburg and been introduced to
> the cause  
> there.
> 
> **********
> [Page 91   " 'You realize that the police killed
> your stepson,' "    
> D. is stunned.  She says the police killed him and called
> it  
> suicide.   Katri is belligerent and restless.   She's
> apparently   
> looking for the list of names which Maximov has.  "
> ' Are you one of  
> Nechaev's people? ' "   She glares,
> "triumphant."  Would I tell you?   
> Do you know the police are watching this house?]
> 
> The question at that point is who is Ivan working for?  How
> did Pavel  
> really die?  We have more dark, brooding suspense.
> 
> *********
> 
> [  Page 92 - Katri, in D.'s mind,  is in the grip of a
> devil.  "The  
> devil inside her twitching, skipping, unable to keep
> still."  ]
> 
> *This is certainly the theme and spirit of Demons.
> 
> [ D.  tells himself he will give Ivan shelter if he shows
> up again.   
> "...that is enough for the bargain to hold. "
> * He apparently thinks he has made a bargain with God - but
> it's the  
> same one-sided bargain he told Matryona  Pavel made -
> "if you (God)  
> love me you'll save me."
> 
> *********
> 
> [ Page 93 - But D. knows he can do more than be willing  -
> he can  
> actually go forth and save Ivanov from his cold watchpost. 
>  So he  
> searches for him in order to offer him shelter again and
> finally  
> thinking, "I have done what I can."    "But
> he knows in his heart he  
> has not.  There is more he could do, much more."  ]
> 
> *  What more could he do?   He's wrestling with the
> angel here for  
> sure - with an internal spiritual force - a fight which has
> its  
> origins in some really basic human condition.
> 
> Bekah