IVIV: Rhus Frothington

[kelber at mindspring.com]

Many apologies for falling so far behind in the reading -- still straggling in Chapter 16.

Anyway, thought of something regarding Rhus Frothington, Penny's office-mate.  She appears to be a caricature of a humorless, anti-male, frothing-at-the-mouth feminist (golly, I've never met anyone like that!).  The Frothing-ton is pretty overt, but I'm wondering if the Rhus might refer to Joanna Russ:

http://www.nndb.com/people/553/000029466/

She's a feminist sci-fi writer who was a contemporary of Pynchon's at Cornell, where she majored in English.  I've read and enjoyed her book The Female Man. It's easy enough to imagine that, had she rubbed shoulders with Pynchon back in their college days, her attitude towards him might have been similar to Rhus' attitude to Doc.

Laura