Rilke & Page 666 in my text ;-)

[alice wellintown]

Blicero's reading of Rilke is so warped that he  takes his
mission as "transformation" of Earth into the Kingdom of
Death. He longs, Weissmann longs, but he longs to part with
humanity and nature. He will become the apotheosis of
gnostic alchemy, a cult that seeks nothing less than a
surrogate order that will dominate natural cycles through
artifice and stasis. The term transformation, I'm sure,
caused the hair on the back of those readers familiar enough
with Rilke's use of this term back in 1973 that several
early reviews of the novel claimed that the most important
cultural figure in Gravity's Rainbow was Rainer Maria Rilke
and that the book could be read as a serio-comic variation
on Rilke's Duino Elegies and their German Romantic echoes in
Nazi culture.  Weissmann's transformation is infrahuman,
demonic, a Qlippoth in gnostic terms.  In fact, Enzian, who
speculates that Blicero has become a "fabulous monster",
explicitly connects his fate with the gnostic hierarchy.
Enzian says, "If he is alive," he may have changed by now
past our recognition. We could have driven under him in the
sky today and never seen. Whatever happened at the end, he
has transcended. Even if he's only dead. He's gone beyond
his pain, his sin-driven deep into Their province, into
control, synthesis and control [GR.660-61]. These terms
(synthesis and control) are exactly those used by the ghost
of Walter Rathenau to describe the gnostic principles that
actually drive history, as opposed to surface illusions of
cause and effect.  As an adherent to the Cartel, Blicero
joins in encouraging the proliferation of "structures
favoring Death." Look high, Death, death which is a
pornography, Death which impersonates life. One of the
reasons I insisted on the LSD as chemistry of METAPHYSICAL
control, determinism during GRGR is that in GR the stakes
are high. The Faustian Quest is for Earth's HOLY GRAIL, HER
VIRGINITY and PROCREATIVE MYSTERY, and the Jive Ass
Mother-Fucker's Formula for  SIN is Control  of the secrets
in "the hearts of certain molecules" that will give them
Power to synthesize an alternative to natural processes of
Life itself  and to control the unfolding of all events,
thus fulfilling the gnostic nightmare of stasis and
omnipotence. It is this gnosis that has enabled Blicero to
lose his last vestiges of moral responsibility in the
transcendental labyrinths of control. The result of this
divestiture is an aura of absolute and disembodied
evil, of Qlippoth spirituality, that causes the band of
homosexual prisoners-the "175'S" from the Dora camp-to
choose Blicero as the head of an "invisible SS" that will
carry beyond earthly bounds the principles of Nazi
oppression: "He is the Zone's worst specter. He is
malignant, he pervades the lengthening summer nights. Like a
cankered root he is changing, growing toward winter, growing
whiter, toward the idleness and the famine. ...His power is
absolute. "

Now that's on page 666! Transformation!



March 11, 1973
One of the Longest, Most Difficult, Most Ambitious Novels in Years
By RICHARD LOCKE
Gravity's Rainbow By Thomas Pynchon

http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/05/18/reviews/pynchon-rainbow.html