V-2 -Chapter 9 - prolegomenon & apologia

[Robin Landseadel]

First off, a tip of the hat -- and the potential flexing of other  
bodily parts -- to my worthy constituent MB, who managed to get  the  
Hoi-Polloi of the P-List to wake up and bandy about the structural  
edifice of these missiles contributed for the sake of financial stimu- 
ahem, simulation Anyway at least justifying the author's quitting his  
day job.

Which he did.

Liking, enjoying, worshiping and otherwise being a fanboy of "V." is  
not my job description. Others -- who choose not to host, yea, but  
hide in the shadows of fear, shame and that ratty little pharmacy off  
of Essex that He or She claims to have a decent egg-cream but we all  
should know better by now -- may claim the low, skulking predatory  
road of literary exegesis.

I call on a higher power.

	I, as Robert Stack, Address My God

	Lord, though I mouth the words of others,
	may the truth in my eyes belie them ever,
	and thus may I, in first run or in rerun,
	lead no man, or woman, astray.

	Lord, may all know that in my mind
	I wear a hat,
	though none they see;
	that in my mind I wear no trousers,
	though well creased and cuffed they see.

	Lord, may they know these things,
	and know then as well, all viewers
	of the Lifetime Network, Television for
	Women:
	no wife, no daughter, is safe from me.

	Lord, in thy mercy, forgive me.

And yea, in these early pre-dawn hours, awaiting the Sun's  
resurrection as Aus Liebe from Bach's BWV 244 floats drearily by my  
right ear, in the hour of my deepest weed, confusion must be wrought.

In spite of all my previous catcalls 'n' jeers there is something  
about this chapter -- it is as if the author flipped a switch and  
suddenly we are in the center of Gravity's Rainbow or Against the Day.  
Or perhaps one of TRP's Boeing/CIA connections gave young Thomas a  
time machine of his very own and the author of this chapter is a  
trespasser from the Channel View development. Glancing idly at the  
first pages I see several reams of exegesis awaiting. Assuming I can  
tear myself away from this blown-up image of the Paul Foster Case  
Temperance card I'm now painting and amending. Or the new Somali  
"Clio" who carries the catfishing toy right to my feet, like it was my  
job or something.

As I recall, or this computer recalls, the young author quit his day  
job at the Bomarc Service News before publishing this premature tombeau.

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_essays_together.html

http://wapedia.mobi/en/Bomarc_Missile_Program

http://www.boeing.com/history/boeing/bomarc.html

http://themilitarystandard.com/missile/bomarc/mcguire_afb.php

There used to be weblinks to an excellent article concerning Pynchon's  
writing for the Bomarc Service News, but the links have been erased. I  
do believe there is a national security issue in all of this. Remember  
that the young author's job at Boeing -- sounds like he's writing  
magazines for an airliner's in-flight service, doesn't it? --  got him  
"top secret" clearance and that the Bomarc missile was essentially a  
doomsday device.

http://www.radomes.org/museum/recent/LangleyAFBBOMARCVA.html

Whatever doomsday paranoia ripples through these books laid before us  
to eat, that paranoia was born from the author's personal experience.  
If Mondaugen's story resonates, perhaps it would be due to the  
author's easy identification with Mondaugen and how easy it could have  
been for the young author to have followed him down that path..





" And many people ask
"Who are Studs TurKAL?"
It's not "Who are Studs TurKAL?"
it's "Who am Studs TurKAL? "