V-2 - Chapter 9 - More voluptuous than fat

[kelber at mindspring.com]

"Voluptuous" is a stand-in for homosexual or maybe pansexual, but I don't think Pynchon's point is to tell us that Mondaugen's gay [in fact, he seems to be hetero, what with trying to get a glimpse of Vera's bod through her negligee and his various encounters with Hedwig (before any Angry Inch associations with that name)].

Mondaugen's voluptuous.  Evan Godolphin's "such a fat boy." Benny Profane's : "a great amoebalike boy, soft and fat."  Slothrop?  Damn! I can't find the page reference, but I'm positive he's described as being on the chunky side (the first person to find the reference wins a Disgusting English Candy!).  At any rate, he spends a lot of time in a pig suit.

I have no fucking idea if Pynchon read much Russian literature, but here's Oblomov: [can't vouch for the public domain, on-line translation] 
"In general, to judge from the extreme whiteness of his bare neck, his small, puffy hands, and his soft shoulders, one would conclude that he possessed an effeminate body."

In Oblomov's case, and, I'm guessing the same for Kurt, Evan, Benny and Ty, the effeminate, piggy softness is a sign of sloth; a depressed passivity towards life and the complexities of the world.  Mondaugen shuts himself up in his turret (Like Oedipa?), trying to make sense of the ghosts of the past, but not wanting to engage with them.  He's a colonialist by birth, rather than mentality.  Of course, once he breaks free of his turret, he enters full force into the world domination V-2 thing - look out Belgium and England.  Evan, Benny and Tyrone are conflicted: can you be in the game without being co-opted?  Tyrone gets out.  Oblomov, in the end, jumps in.

Laura

-----Original Message-----
>From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>

>
>But two suggestive remarks: Do we think that Homosexuality in early Pynchon
>is another metaphor, uh, a kind of real metaphor which might refute myself-- for 
>the unnatural?...That his belief/hope that nature is, at base,
>a value worth believing in, here in V. he shared The [Catholic] Church's belief 
>that Gayness was against natural law?  And at least often caused by our
>distorting society? 
>
>
>----- Original Message ----
>From: Robin Landseadel <robinlandseadel at comcast.net>
>To: pynchon-l at waste.org
>Sent: Fri, October 15, 2010 8:44:20 AM
>Subject: V-2 - Chapter 9 - More voluptuous than fat
>
>    . . . More voluptuous than fat, with fair hair, long eyelashes and a shy 
>smile that enchanted older women . . .
>
>    Aw, the sodium lights-aren't, so bright in Berlin,
>    I go to the bars dear, but nobody's in!
>    Oh, I'd much rather bee
>    In a Greek trage-dee,
>    Than be a VICTIM IN A VACUUM to-nite!
>
>A bit of the history of Nazi prosecution of Homosexuals within the S.S.:
>
>http://tinyurl.com/278xd38
>=====================================
>
>    Now Gravity’s Rainbow is a token of this
>    man’s genius…he told me so himself…
>    that he could…in other words, have been
>    more specific, but rather than to allude
>    the mundane, he has come to the
>    conclusion that brevity is the importance
>    of our shallow existence.
>    
>    God damn.
>
>
>