V-2 - Chapter 9 - More voluptuous than fat

[Mark Kohut]

Although it took me a few slothful months to read Oblomov, my reading being an 
objective correlative, I loved it. I had Slothrop's sloth then. (Ever read 
Goncharov's book with Frigate in the title?; I could look it up...same 
surprising slow luxuripous prose---another objective corrrelative. They're 
everywhere.).

Oblomov, said my Russian prof I think or else it was Vladimir N. or else I made 
it up, is the Russian aristocrat living out entropy, so to translate. To spin 
with
the Henry Adams salad-a-whirl, he is the best symbol of the Degradation of The 
Aristocratic Ideal in print........

So, now I say: In V.....yes, Slothrop is roundedly fat too, but I leave him out 
for now---this fatness by its representatives of Empire is...........
a metaphor ........for the fatness of Empire....??

I'm serious, albeit light-headed.

Mark


----- Original Message ----
From: "kelber at mindspring.com" <kelber at mindspring.com>
To: pynchon-l at waste.org
Sent: Fri, October 15, 2010 3:29:11 PM
Subject: Re: V-2 - Chapter 9 - More voluptuous than fat

"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.
>
>
>