TR . . sure Gaddis is christian in perverse way (shade of gray)

[Mark Kohut]

So, one way a parody of Goethe's Faust would go
is that the protagonist would find through a experience(s)
he would never want to live in forever---this world...

Or, might Gaddis with his massed overwhelmingness,
meant he wanted to o'ercome even Goethe's massive
Faust with overwhelming experiences? 



----- Original Message ----
From: Ray Easton <kraimie at gmail.com>
To: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Wed, April 13, 2011 4:43:09 PM
Subject: Re: TR . . sure Gaddis is christian in perverse way (shade of gray)

On Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 6:28 AM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Since my early Faust postings, I have learned from wikipedia article
> on Gaddis that he started this novel as a PARODY of Faust....
>
> what's that mean, I ask myself? That the 'hero' lives in the hell
> of this world and then gets 'saved" rather than the reverse? (Although
> as kai informs, goethe's Faust beats the devil's rap)....


Note that Gaddis quotes from Goethe's Faust, rather than Marlowe's (or
some other version).

Goethe's Faust does NOT make a deal to trade his soul for knowledge.
Instead, he agrees that Mepistopheles may have him when and if he
(Faust) finds an experience such that he wants it to endure forerver.

Werd’ ich zum Augenblicke sagen:
Verweile doch! du bist so schön!
Dann magst du mich in Fesseln schlagen,
Dann will ich gern zu Grunde gehn!


Ray