IVIV20: They both knew, 356-359

[Joseph Tracy]

So under the paving stones the beach, and under the beach the graves  
of the native inhabitants , portals to the spirit world and under  
that another more ancient dream, home of the biggest waves.
On Jan 18, 2010, at 9:04 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:

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> --- On Mon, 1/18/10, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
>> Subject: Re: IVIV20: They both knew, 356-359
>> To: "Paul Nightingale" <isread at btinternet.com>
>> Date: Monday, January 18, 2010, 9:03 AM
>> and in which we learn what is under
>> the beach: Graveyards of native Americans which they
>> believed were portals to the spirit world. Gordita Beach is
>> built on one...........
>>
>> --- On Mon, 1/18/10, Paul Nightingale <isread at btinternet.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> From: Paul Nightingale <isread at btinternet.com>
>>> Subject: IVIV20: They both knew, 356-359
>>> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
>>> Date: Monday, January 18, 2010, 12:12 AM
>>> Pursuing the Golden Fang, Sauncho
>>> bringing Doc back to the here-&-now. The
>>> "pair of greenish blobs" (356) recalls the "little
>> blobs of
>>> color" on 351,
>>> not to mention the "paint chips" on 354, or even the
>>> "cubist rose" on
>>> 355-356; and then, of course, the radio "sound[s] like
>> a
>>> Gordita Beach bar
>>> any night of the week" (356). The schooner proves
>> elusive
>>> and again the
>>> action is quite inconsequential. Sauncho ("Well, that
>> lets
>>> us out") gives up
>>> easily, perhaps oddly so, given his apparent
>> enthusiasm for
>>> the chase
>>> earlier, "moving faster than Doc had ever seen him"
>> (354).
>>>
>>> What follows will be observed at a distance by Sauncho
>> and
>>> Doc; so possibly
>>> their presence is now quite superfluous. Observers
>> rather
>>> than participants;
>>> observation and reading as participation. But then,
>>> fast-forward to the
>>> section's closing exchange on 359: without Sauncho and
>> Doc
>>> as witnesses
>>> "[t]here'd be only the government story".
>>>
>>> And so to "St Flip of Lawndale's mythical break, also
>> known
>>> to old-timers as
>>> Death's Doorsill" (358), a paragraph that begins by
>>> confirming their shared
>>> knowledge/understanding. On 357 Doc suspects the
>> Golden
>>> Fang is leading them
>>> into a trap; a page later he thinks he sees the
>> Preserved.
>>> He might put it
>>> down to poor visibility, but again there is the
>>> recollection of an ethical
>>> alternative.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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