V--2nd, Chapter 9

[Robin Landseadel]

On Oct 15, 2010, at 7:23 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:

> Robin:
> In any case this set-up notes how it's ideal on account of having  
> the room
> acoustically isolated, which is very important if you're monitoring  
> angry
> ghosts.
>
> As with TRP at his greatest, this also works metaphorically, imho.  
> Acoustically
> isolated--separated from the world---even reminds me  of the sealed- 
> off house
> party going on in "Entropy"...Remind anyone else?

This may also be part of what Terri is referring to in "Magic  
Mountain" as well, the way that miniature League of Nations managed to  
be hermetically sealed against the rest of the world.

> Mondaugen's sferics are a Maxwell's Demon-like way of controlling  
> sounds, so to
> speak, against the natural entropic way of the world....???? Spec,  
> spec,
> bring it on...........

This is early Pynchon, his awareness of the psychical is limited in  
comparison to what it became. There are ghost story elements here, one  
element is the deliberate withholding of particulars. But by the time  
we get to Against the Day . . .

I don't see any element of control here, or in Maxwell's Demon. Both  
seem to be more about hearing and channeling, the Maxwell's Demon  
sounds suspiciously like an E-Meter. Moundaugen sounds like he might  
land a job at the German equivalent of PISCES.