back to IVing IV: "What", Doc wondered aloud, "the fuck, is going on here?"

[Mark Kohut]

I'll take another word on "friend' but it won't be enemies.

Just trying to characterize the women he has some mutually satisfying sex with. And continues to talk to---Shasta; with another 'very friendly' encounter coming up---even after the relationship is 'over".

You will not allow any characterological meaning to Doc's willingness to 
'trust' even bad guys, as he states early. 



--- On Wed, 12/2/09, alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: back to IVing IV: "What", Doc wondered aloud, "the fuck, is going  on here?"
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> Date: Wednesday, December 2, 2009, 9:15 PM
> >Mark Kohut wrote:
> > p. 283 Doc's  'first thought' was for Penny's safety
> after looking at this
> > folder. Doc is presented as a tender-hearted
> type---outside of a one-on-one with some Badasses--once
> again. P shows us steady thoughts of others, especially his
> women "friends".
> 
> Again, I'm reading a very different Larry. The text doesn't
> say his
> first thought was FOR her safety. He understands that she
> might have
> put herself in grave danger by treating the file as any
> other sealed
> ancient history file when it is in fact a very special
> file; it's a
> file that people she works with and people she works for,
> as well as
> other dangerous people, don't want her reading or slipping
> to people
> like Larry. Now, Larry only realizes the super grave nature
> of this
> file after he starts reading it, but he knew that it was no
> typical
> sealed ancient history file. He knew she was putting
> herself at risk.
> He only now realizes how much risk. Penny, it seems has no
> clue. Not a
> fair trade. He traded a wall paper penny stock for a bundle
> of blue
> chips. As they say, it's another day and every dog will
> have one. This
> one belongs to Larry. But let's not confuse one good trade
> with a
> positive year. Penny is not his friend. No definition of
> friendship
> allows that one can shop one's friends or put them in
> serious harm to
> satisfy one's curiosity or get a job done or keep one. No,
> put it in
> quotes, but it ain't even close to a friend. An enemy is
> more like it.
> And Larry is a coward. What Penny did is fairly low on the
> courage
> scale because she didn't know the danger she was in. If she
> knew how
> dangerous that file was when she took it and gave it to
> Larry, we
> might call her fairly courageous, but not a hero because
> she didn't
> take that risk for her friends or brothers and sisters, but
> in
> exchange for information. What Larry did is cowardice. He
> downplayed
> the risk and sent her in harms way to satisfy his own needs
> and
> desires.
>