V- 2nd: Ogling Rachel

[Heikki Raudaskoski]

Right, I'd rather say that the Owlglass/Eulenspiegel bit might be there to
relativize the Rachel/purity bit. FWIW.

Might also be another self-referential gesture to connect the novel, at
least its Profane parts, to a certain anti-transcendental, crudely humorous
tradition.


Heikki

On Fri, 18 Jun 2010 kelber at mindspring.com wrote:

> Don't really see Rachel in the role of prankster or trickster.  Our introduction to her is very off-putting, but to the extent that the character's developed later on, she's intelligent, kind and level-headed.
>
> Laura
>
> -----Original Message-----
> >From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> >Sent: Jun 17, 2010 11:07 AM
> >To: Heikki Raudaskoski <hraudask at sun3.oulu.fi>
> >Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> >Subject: Re: V- 2nd: Ogling Rachel
> >
> >From wikipedia article:
> >Ultimately, Eulenspiegel's pranks are not primarily about the exposure of human weaknesses and malice but the implicit breaking up and sublation of a given status of consciousness by means of negation itself (animus) as that which Eulenspiegel embodies. The common element of the Eulenspiegel stories consists by and large in turning the mental horizon prevailing in them upside down and unseating it by a higher one. .............The German term "Landfahrer" (≈ "vagrant") defines Eulenspiegel's social position best and most comprehensively. In his highly pronounced mobility are expressed the animus-inspired Late Middle Ages. Thus Till Eulenspiegel implicitly personifies the constitution of consciousness of this time. With Eulenspiegel's death occurs the entry of the embodied trickster-animus into the medium of things spiritual,...
> > 
> >apply to Rachel?
> >
> >
> >
> >----- Original Message ----
> >From: Heikki Raudaskoski <hraudask at sun3.oulu.fi>
> >To: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> >Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> >Sent: Thu, June 17, 2010 10:32:06 AM
> >Subject: Re: V- 2nd: Ogling Rachel
> >
> >
> >
> >Dunno if it has been mentioned yet, but Owlglass is also a translation
> >of the last name of that proto-picaro, Till Eulenspiegel:
> >
> >http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Till_Eulenspiegel
> >
> >
> >Heikki (catching up little by little)
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >On Tue, 15 Jun 2010, Mark Kohut wrote:
> >
> >> Anyone but me see Owlglass as a near-pun on Hourglass (as in a desirable female figure)...
> >>
> >> A...and a woman who looks into a mirror Owl-like?  Who? Who?  Seeing only the things she desires,
> >> no real ...self?
> >>
> >> Her love for inanimate things, like her car, is a nice capturing of America's car culture and consumer
> >> goods society?
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> >
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>