P, the subjunctive

[alice wellintown]

Like Grace and Free Will, the Subjunctive has deep Puritan and
Calvinist roots in American Literature and can found even in Twain.
The subjunctive is what allows the dark ironies of Hawthonre,
Melville, Poe, Dickenson, to work, and it is, even in a DIckenson,
where we discover the finest humor and repose.

http://www.uiowapress.org/books/2010-fall/heretical-fictions.htm

On Sun, Dec 5, 2010 at 8:45 AM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
> tony tanner in his essay-review of Mason & Dixon
> sez that a key word in it---he gives the emblematic
> example--is 'the subjunctive', the 'had it taken a different path' concept
> ...America, say or
>
> In V, the West, yes?
>
> He also wrote "what Pynchon realizes, beyond any contemporary
> writer, is that the best way to be deadly serious is to be whimsically
> unserious."
>
> "the serious unserious of Pynchon's writing is a wonderful thing."
>
>
>
>