IVing IV, a touching touch

[Mark Kohut]

OK. I keep misreading you, too, I guess. 

--- On Tue, 12/1/09, alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: IVing IV, a touching touch
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Date: Tuesday, December 1, 2009, 8:03 PM
> It's not a matter of how I'm reading
> Penny; our disagreement, and it
> has been here from the start, has to do with my reading of
> Larry. I'm
> with the lady cats.
> 
> On Tue, Dec 1, 2009 at 10:46 AM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> > Alice wrties:
> > "Penny, a flat land lady just sold his ass to the feds
> and she got nothing for doing it."
> >
> > I think you are missing the clear insight of Doc's
> that she is protected from the Feds doing something shitty
> TO her. Doc got it. Feds are to Penny
> > a They with a mysterious "something on her". Who knows
> what? busting her for dope?
> >
> > And, Doc only trusts her enough for info and sex when
> it sprung up. You are
> > holding more extratextual resentment against Penny
> than Doc is, and as TRP is (in this case), in my judgment.
> >
> > Yet, there are clear tender moments....they remind me
> of the exhortation that resounds at the end of
> GR.............
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --- On Tue, 12/1/09, alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> From: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
> >> Subject: Re: IVing IV, a touching touch
> >> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> >> Date: Tuesday, December 1, 2009, 10:24 AM
> >> On 12/1/09, Michael Bailey <michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >> > ok right,
> >> >
> >> > alice wrote:
> >> > >As if Penny is an empty vessel that must
> be filled
> >> with a male's love
> >> > >or whatever? Penny don't need no Doctor;
> she's a
> >> healthy gal. When
> >> > >Penny touches Doc, she communicates
> something that
> >> has nothing to do
> >> > >with traditional marriage, but with
> business; it's
> >> professional.
> >> >
> >> > it's the little touches like that, though,
> that light
> >> up
> >> > the romantic side of the tale.
> >>
> >> This touch is about power. She disarms him by
> touching
> >> his.
> >>
> >> >
> >> > You're right, how many married guys' wives
> call them
> >> Doc anyway?
> >> > (probably not even too many real doctors I
> would
> >> imagine)
> >> >
> >> > So they would have to put that nickname to
> bed
> >> somehow.
> >> >
> >> > But that there isn't a romantic streak in the
> most
> >> professional
> >> > of career women including Penny, and a
> similar plexus
> >> operative
> >> > in Doc, is an assumption that seems disproven
> by
> >> certain tender moments
> >> > when the possibility arises like a crystal
> palace.
> >>
> >> Certain tender moments?
> >>
> >> Polonius speaks tenderly to his children, but he
> doesn't
> >> trust them. A
> >> rotten Denmark is rotten to the heart and core.
> Penny, a
> >> flat land
> >> lady just sold his ass to the feds and she got
> nothing for
> >> doing it.
> >>
> >> She's still down at the bottom of the treehouse,
> where the
> >> only privy
> >> she is privy to is what the boyz piss down upon
> her. But
> >> she keeps on
> >> trying to get a look inside that treehouse, to
> climb its
> >> rope ladder,
> >> to look down on the world from up there, even if
> she has to
> >> sell Larry
> >> out again and again to prove she's one of the
> boyz. She
> >> sleeps with
> >> him, feels something, I wouldn't call it
> "tenderness", the
> >> weed helps,
> >> even prolongs the "tender" moment, but it ain't
> tender,
> >> it's just
> >> earning her stripes. I'd call that fucking,
> >> sucking,  and smoking the
> >> pain, the guilt away.
> >>
> >> >
> >> > Can people can be so public-minded (external
> locus of
> >> control)
> >> > that career subsumes individual yearnings
> even in
> >> semi-private interactions?
> >> >
> >> > Not saying it doesn't happen:
> >> > Roger and Jessica play this out but Beaver
> wins.
> >> His role in society
> >> > trumps whatever private closeness Roger is
> able to
> >> develop with Jessica.
> >> > But Roger's mother is the War.
> >> >
> >> > Doc's real parents provide him with a
> childhood he
> >> doesn't want to escape from.
> >> > It's something worth passing on.  Perhaps
> Vehi
> >> will one day
> >> > send him on a trip provoking meditations upon
> his
> >> Larryhood.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > - "The doctor said give him jug band music;
> it seems
> >> to make him feel
> >> > just fine!"
> >> >
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> >
>