V-2nd - Chapter 10: FLIP FLOP
Mark Kohut
markekohut at yahoo.com
Sat Nov 13 16:25:11 CST 2010
in this FLIP FLOP section, binariness is, not surprisingly, alluded to. Grows in
prominence to Vineland (and beyond, I guess).
Does not seem to have the same resonances yet here in V.--or does it?
Rereading yet again, I am struck by the bleakness of the NY of 1956 here. Yes,
vertical death like horizontal stacks of bodies. All dead.
And that long passage Laura quoted about all kinds of deaths in the dog days."in
a congruent world that did not care"---very echoing of
existentialism (as a philosophy) phrases...
Bleaker than Bleak House. What a wasteland.
----- Original Message ----
From: "kelber at mindspring.com" <kelber at mindspring.com>
To: pynchon-l at waste.org
Sent: Thu, November 11, 2010 10:50:07 PM
Subject: V-2nd - Chapter 10: FLIP FLOP
Straight lines and 90 degree angles are generally a sign of bad shit in
Pynchon. There are various references to 90 degree angles in V. Having sex is
"going horizontal," or "rotating 90 degrees," as Rachel describes having sex
with Slab. In Chapter 11, Fausto says "... the physical being-there of a bed or
horizontal plane determines what we call love ..." Do humans rotate 90 degrees
to make love (or what we "call" love)? Or is that what automatons do? SHROUD
(or is it SHOCK?) warns Benny that it's too late - humans are nearly automatons.
How did it happen (or more to the point, what is Pynchon afraid has happened)?
In this chapter, Mclintic starts obsessing about the nature of the electronic
flip-flop circuit (used to create a strobe or pulsating effect between two
states). He plays with the words: flip, as in go crazy, and flop, as in to
rest. During periods of war, we flip. During peace, we flop. Here's an image
of war craziness, supplied to Benny by SHROUD:
(p. 322): "Thousands of Jewish corpses, stacked up like those poor [junkyard]
car-bodies." Corpses stacked horizontally: FLIP
Later, Stencil crams into the rush-hour subway:
(p. 330): "Vertical corpses ..." Corpses stacked vertically: FLOP
The angle of 90 degrees is all [well, not really, all, but still ...] that
separates war-time atrocities from the alienation of industrialized society?
The War gave us a taste for stacking bodies that's so ingrained in us, we can't
resist it in peacetime. Rotating the stack 90 degrees simulates love? Peace?
Laura
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