CoL49 (5)

[Robin Landseadel]

On Jun 25, 2009, at 5:53 AM, Monte Davis wrote:

> Laura sez:
>
>> I don't really get the feeling that Pierce has guided Oedipa
>> towards Tristero and W.A.S.T.E.  She seems to have found them
>> by the act of questioning Pierce's investments, the source of
>> his wealth, starting with the bones-into-charcoal dealings.
>
> Much of M&D, of course,  is a "questioning of the source of" the US'
> collective wealth. As are AtD's cross-cuts from miners to Vibes,  
> Vibes to
> inventors, etc. One could go on.
>
> When my sons were in 3rd/5th grade -- holiday-pageant days at their  
> schools
> -- I was musing one Thanksgiving about the primacy of the Pilgrim- 
> Plymouth
> Rock narrative. Because of New England's early and lasting  
> concentration of
> scholarly divines, colleges, publishers, etc., it was able to stamp  
> its own
> story -- usually purged of Roger Williams, Ann Hutchinson, Daniel  
> Shays, and
> the like -- on the nation.
>
> For most of the Anglos' first two centuries here, though, Virginia  
> and its
> region were in fact more populous and richer (and the Caribbean sugar
> islands richer still, for the plantation set). I'm pretty sure that  
> Average
> UK Emigrant pictured a quick score from tobacco or cane, setting his
> children up as leisured squires, rather than digging boulders out of a
> thin-soiled Massachusetts pasture so his chidren could be self- 
> respecting
> Congregationalist abolitionists.
>
> Which is why at a school event that fall, I suggested to a teacher  
> that the
> REAL Thanksgiving pageant, eschewing the Puritans and friendly  
> Squanto,
> would show a Tidewater or Jamaica paterfamilias praying: "Dear  
> easygoing
> Anglican Lord, we thank you for an addictive crop and slaves to tend  
> it."
>
> Like many other pedagogical reforms I've championed, it didn't catch  
> on.
> Beats me why.
>
> -Monte

I love the old Firesign Theater skit, where Thomas Jefferson & Ben  
Franklin talk about forming a new nation: "Hey Tom! Let's invite a  
bunch of immigrants over and make cars!"