Recog ch 2 last word is "alchemy" in that chapter

[Jed Kelestron]

Due in large part to Carl Jung's voluminous writings on alchemy as a
symbolic map of the structure and dynamics of the human psyche,
authors like Pynchon and Gaddis use alchemy liberally in their
fiction. At this point (I.2) Gaddis is just getting warmed up. The
ouroboros adorning the frontpiece of The Recognitions is a symbol of
the alchemical opus, a cyclical process culminating in the union of
opposites. The subject of alchemy is also another pole in the binary
opposites of magic/science and occultism/Christianity.