V-2nd - Chapter 8 - Section IV - Stencil's soliloquy

[Michael Bailey]

On Sun, Oct 10, 2010 at 6:51 PM,  <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

> First of all, Mr. Bailey, fantastic postings!  I've read and ruminated on all of them, and apologize for not getting it together to write pithy responses of agreement and wonder.
>

Thanks!  I might add, I feel the same way about not engaging enough
with great postings you (and others) make.  It's beginning to dawn on
me that a lot of the thoughts that I take the most enjoyment and
profit from don't actually originate in my own head...

> The above point that you make as you head out the door is worthy of a week's discussion on its own. The observation seems very much in keeping with the developing Pynchon persona:  ignore the goddess, the natural, the mystical, and you end up with a phallocentric, imperialistic, technocratic stand-in, i.e. V., which is a metaphor for the 20th century, and certainly seems to be Pynchon's dominant theme by the time he gets to ATD.
>


yes, there is a lot of truth in that.  The feminist movement (I think,
but can't quote exactly) has objected to putting women on a pedestal.
Respect for "woman qua woman" has to reach some kind of inspirational
stratum, but also remain realistic.
And to feel out the boundaries of realism, one has to engage with the
inspiration constantly, rather than neglect it and only occasionally
perceive distortions of it!

If Stencil finds that V. is simply a female version of himself, he
will be disappointed.

So perhaps he, too, is looking for something beyond equality or equivalence.
(A separate question is whether the femininity of V. is the sole
quality that puts her in a special category?  I think it's entwined
with her specialness, but perhaps not the entirety of it...maybe
"femininity that ought to be properly respected but isn't...")

like you said, another week or even a couple of weeks on just the
implications of that question might allow proper consideration.
There's the divinity question ("Nature and Nature's God" properly
considered being the entirety of physical law including the fact that
we don't know it all, and the distinction between that idea and the
idea of embodying it in a person - elaborately done with Jesus, and
Mary, in the Catholic Christian tradition especially, but perhaps
those adorations do not encompass all the necessary adorations the
soul requires..."greater things than these ye shall do" said Jesus and
he is still waiting for some of them, no doubt) - the authority
question (our idea of divinity has a lot to do with the power to make
things happen; our idea of good religion an authority to which one can
satisfyingly submit - isn't it?) - the polymorphous perversity
question (is the "getting along well - even to the point of sexual
satisfaction - with *things* something that is primarily a female
achievement?  To what extent does the bubble of grace surrounding Fina
and Rachel originate in them, or does it depend to some extent on
Profane's waxing and waning belief ("meditate in my direction" as
Olivia Newton-John sang in "Grease"), or again is this fluxing faith
of his dependent on their exercise of this power?)

and many more!





-- 
- But you can wade in the water
and never get wet
if you keep on doin' that rag (Grateful Dead, "Doin' That Rag")