V-2nd - Chap 8 / I have really never read this book this closely before

[Michael Bailey]

On Wed, Sep 29, 2010 at 10:58 AM,  <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:
> No, I think it was less successful in ATD.

I'm not gonna quite agree with that, although V.'s much more in my
mind right now.
It's pretty complex in itself, and I'm quite chuffed at the new (to
me) ideas I'm posting about it.

Can I recap them in 2 paragraphs?

Like, since Benny and Stencil (hehe, remember the cartoon Beany and
Cecil?) - are both considered as individuals rather than strictly as
citizens ("just for a moment, you aren't what the Caesars say you
are"), with concerns that overshadow outside events, therefore they
see the world thru a glass darkly...

so that such shadows as a) the overthrow of Arbenz and how it gave the
lie to the benevolent intentions of the US b) the petroleum-inspired
supplantation of Mossadegh in favor of the Shah and what it did to the
soul of America and the bodies of countless Iranians and c) the
purblind confusion of Eisenhower envisioning Lumumba as a Communist
requiring assassination --- these events appear transformed in Benny
and Stencil's experience as a) the gang-rape of Fina and what his
slinking away meant about the state of Benny's soul, b) the incessant
plotting necessary to establish Baedeker supreme in the land Muhammad
Ali had such ambitious plans for and what it did to the British soul
as epitomized in V. and c) the actions against the Herero whose
outlines were ordered by the faraway German emperor and army-dudes
thinking themselves somehow justified in giving such commands, having
lost any compassion in their gnat-brained mental picture of the
Situation  (like the tiny map Cyprian gets at some point in AtD), but
the details of which were carried out more than faithfully and
embellished with extra cruelty by the local satraps.

>
> The vast list of poorly-realized, often redundant characters (wouldn't two or one Traverse brother have worked just as well?)

omigosh, no!  Which one could we give up?!




-- 
- Too many libraries?  That's an oxymoron or something, isn't it?