C of L49: "Destroying its own message irretrievably" Or, the Immanence of Transcendence

[David Payne]

Great post, Mark! 

Oed realizes that she could have seen God many times (ie in the seizure-like moments) but forgotten. I'd argue that she hasn't. I think the book shows Oed going thru several "failed" revelations. This is the 3rd? 

First on page 1 with the tube staring at her, she tries to feel drunk and speak the true name of god but it doesn't work. 

Second time, this scene is repeated when (a few pages before the seizure scene) Oed's with Thoth (and again with a TV) and the moment crystalizes and she says "My God" but the scene seems to collapse into a who's-on-first misunderstanding. 

Now the seizure is the 3rd failed revealing vision?

We'll see more close calls, I think--including the closing lines--but do we ever see Oed break thru?

> Date: Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:55:22 -0700
> From: markekohut at yahoo.com
> Subject: C of L49: "Destroying its own message irretrievably" Or, the Immanence of Transcendence
> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
> 
> 
> p. 95 "She could, at this stage of things, recognize signals like that, as the epileptic is said to----
> an odor, color, pure piercing grace note announcing his seizure. Afterward it is only this signal, 
> really dross, this secular announcement, and never what is revealed during the attack, that he remembers.
> Oedipa wondered whether, at the end of this (if it were supposed to end), she too
> might not be left with only compiled memories of clues, announcements, intimations, but never the 
> central truth itself, which must somehow each time be too bright for her memory to hold; 
> which must always blaze out, destroying its own message irreversibly, leaving 
> an overexposed blank when the ordinary world came back. In the space of a sip of dandelion wine
> it came clear to her that she would never know how many times such a seizure may already have visited,
> or how to grasp it should it visit again. Perhaps even in this last second---but there was no way to tell.
> She glanced down the corridor of Cohen's rooms in the rain and saw, for the very first time, how far it 
> might be possible to get lost in this."
> 
> Wonderfully written, seemingly VERY THEMATICALLY IMPORTANT paragraph. Let's unpack some layers. 
> 
> [Misc. Dostoevsky is the most famous God-obsessed writer who experienced epilepsy. Dick may have had temporal lobe epilepsy. I may send misc. words on the phenomenon in another post]
> 
> I'm going to throw out a reading, one I've hinted at in my posting: O. can 'at this stage of things', i.e. in what she is learning in her quest, recognize 'signals'.......'pure piercing grace note"---Notice Pierce's name and another important P word....
>  
> I suggest that this is one of P's most direct 'statements' that the Word [of God], the revelation [of God] is not known to us in this world as anything Transcendent IF He exists as a Transcendent Being....Or, postmodernly maybe, we have
> to live in the uncertainty of any certainty regarding Transcendence.....
>  
> Clues; A 'secular announcement' ---like Gabriel to Mary; like a Rilke angel---that could come from beyond the secular?
> Clues: 'at the end of this (if it were to end)...suggesting this is our constant daily fate (since the uncertainty never ends
> by the end of the novella)...
> Clues: "never the central truth itself".....Stelliforous Meaning, Transcendent Certainty........reminds of p-listers who have
> harped on the theme (in later works) that Paradise [Shambala], What Makes It, is only pointed to, never fully articulated.  
> Also, reminiscent of Wittgenstein's thoughts on religious belief, in some ways. We know TRP has read him. 
> Clues: 'when the ordinary world came back. Again, I'm going to argue that one of P's key beliefs is that, whatever Truths might be Transcendent (if any) , they also must exist in 'the ordinary world"....
> Clues: So, such everday transcendentals, so to speak, have been happening, always happening, we don't even know
> how many there might have been and are, since they 'blaze out'.....
>  
> Also, 'blaze out' remind of some merging of rocket apocalypse [in GR] and God-as-Light-filled experience? 
> 
> 
>       
> 

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