IVIV (11) p. 163-164

[John Bailey]

Great stuff Clement,

Just doing some tracing of the Golden Fang/Preserved's movements and
the weird IV timeline.

The Preserved disappeared in the 50s "somewhere between San Pedro and
Papeete [French Polynesia]". It reappeared a couple of years later off
Cuba as The Golden Fang. (p 92-3)

(I *really* don't get how it could be missing for several years yet be
"instantly, as if by occult forces, relocated to the other side of the
planet". It was missing. This makes no sense at all.)

Anyway, this magical relocation echoes the ship's more recent movements.

On p95 Doc reads that The Golden Fang left San Pedro "last week" with
Shasta on board. In the time since, it's gone wherever it was taking
Shasta, she got off and made it to a (probably) French Polynesian
island, and it went on to the Virgin Islands (p90) and back to LA, at
least. Once again, it travelled from the middle of the Pacific to the
middle of the Caribbean in a really short time. How?

This isn't unusual; there are plenty of wormholes or intra-earth
tunnels in Pynchon.

Also, what's in the Pacific that is frequently associated with the
Golden Fang? Lemuria. It's even intimated that Lemuria is what allows
the ship to escape late in the novel.

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 12:18 PM, Michael Bailey
<michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com> wrote:
> Clément Lévy  wrote:
>
>>  Cootie Food for coup de foudre (144) so far.
>
> thanks for translating that, before and now
>
>> - cold capsules: they are full of tiny multicolor beads. Sorting them by
>> color must be exhausting.
>
> this was a real theory that circulated in 1969-70, like smoking bananas.
> I tried it myself with "Contac" capsules.  It took a long time.
> As far as I can remember, it didn't work.
>
>