closer and closer he tries to read, asking questions

[Robin Landseadel]

	Oedipa stood in the living room, stared at by the greenish dead
	 eye of the TV tube, spoke the name of God.

In my film of CoL49, we start with an image of a 12 - transistor  
pocket radio, silver and black, 4" x 2 & 1/2" x 1". A well manicured  
fingernail, painted bright red, flips on the radio switch and out pours:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A28Ldqa2pAs

The camera slowly zooms on the speaker grill of the pocket radio as  
the music continues [titles and a limited number of credits flash by].  
The round speaker grill fills the screen as the lyric comes to "Run  
by, don't turn back, can't hide from that look in her eyes", we end at  
the end of the drum fill and jump cut  to:

" . . .the greenish dead eye of the TV tube . . ."

. . . as Oed intones the word "God".

This is an invocation, the God is the tube.

This invoking the "God" of the Tube is heresy writ much like John  
Lennon's infamous "We're more popular than Jesus now", comments made  
in March 1966:

	 . . . on 4 March 1966, when Lennon was interviewed for the
	London Evening Standard by Maureen Cleave, [he] talked
	about Christianity by saying: "Christianity will go. It will vanish
	and shrink. I do not know what will go first, rock 'n' roll or
	Christianity...We're more popular than Jesus now". . .
	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lennon

Heresy is a theme at the core of "The Courier's Tragedy". I'll provide  
more information on Giordano Bruno later—the character "Dominico"  
points to Bruno in many ways and in the process touches on heresy, a  
major theme in all of Pynchon's writings.

On May 4, 2009, at 7:58 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:

> Seems right..........She is home in Kinneret [Sea of Galilee,
> obvious religious allusion] , a home that is still "alive" and
> she has received word she is an executrix of a California
> real estate mogul's estate.............

Yes, the book is full of obvious religious allusions. OBA is fully  
aware of the various possible numerological readings for the number  
49, and uses many of those allusions in the book. As soon as the  
Pynchonwiki site is back up and running I'll post a link to my long  
rant on the Number 49 and how it relates to CoL49. But just for  
starters the number 49 is the number of days a soul spends in the  
Bardo State. Timothy Leary, Ph.D., Ralph Metzner, Ph.D., & Richard  
Alpert, Ph.D. came up with "The Psychedelic Experience-A manual based  
on the Tibetan Book of the Dead", a book published in 1964.

http://deoxy.org/psyexp.htm

	. . . Leary argued that psychedelics, used with the right dosage,
	set and setting could, with the guidance of psychology
	professionals, alter behavior in unprecedented and beneficial
	ways.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Leary

"The Psychedelic Experience" led directly to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CMdqWh_J8I

. . . recorded in April & in released in August of 1966, just as the  
"Jesus" controversy was coming to a head.

The 49th Sunday on most Christian calendars is the last Sunday before  
Pentecost. There are many allegorical uses of Revelation and of  
Revelation withheld all through CoL49.

http://tinyurl.com/cdb2tc

> ----- Original Message ----
> From: János Székely <miksaapja at gmail.com>
> To: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Monday, May 4, 2009 10:51:52 AM
> Subject: Re: closer and closer he tries to read, asking questions
>
> 2009/5/4 Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>:
>>
>> Page the first....
>> [Oedipa] "spoke the name of God"......what did she SAY?   "O  
>> God" [whyn't TRP write that if that is it?]  "Jesus Christ!"   She  
>> is a young Republican American................
>
>>
>
> I think the point is not what she says

I think the point is [in part] what she says. She simply invokes God.  
God appears to be in the form of a TV in this construction, the author  
underlines the inert nature of this God. Invocation figures heavily in  
the novel and references to Christian terms and concepts also runs  
throughout the book, in the process creating a dread, a fear of  
Revelation.

> but what she is stared at by
> (and not vice versa). I mean if the TV tube represents an eye that can
> see, death, and God, this is a kind of "sacred moment", if I'm allowed
> to plant such a spoiler.
>
> Janos

This is a kind of a sacred moment. The Crying of Lot 49 is full of  
these heretical sacred moments. I plan on planting spoilers  
everywhere, this book is a tight little bundle of self-reference.