GR translation: the grating of his close-shaved skull

[Paul Mackin]

In addition to the cases for hair stubble as a rough surface and hair as 
a refractor of light, has anyone considered "grating" in the mental sense?

The reflex toward The Change that Rauhandel is experiencing may be 
causing him mental turmoil--it's grating on him-- closely shaved head 
standing for brain or nervous system.

There is the question, consider a few lines down, of whether the young 
man really wants The Change that his (programmed) nervous system is 
foisting upon him.

P.



On 7/16/2011 10:28 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:
> Three uses of grating around hair. Fascinating. thanks, David.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grating
> And going to the internal link 'diffraction grating' herein will learn 
> you [sic; wilfull] that the first experiments happened
> a year after Newton did prism work and involved bird feathers!
> The things we learn in reading Pynchon.
> I think it is time for me to reread Gravity's Rainbow yet again and 
> parse it this time. (There's a job).
> I keep thinking of Pynchon remarking, proudly, to a Viking employee 
> that he typed all the manuscript himself.
>
> *From:* David Payne <dpayne1912 at hotmail.com>
> *To:* Pynchon-l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> *Sent:* Saturday, July 16, 2011 7:45 AM
> *Subject:* RE: GR translation: the grating of his close-shaved skull
>
>
> There's some meaning here that I'm not sure I understand. I found two 
> other places where Pynchon uses "grating" in reference to hair in GR:
>
> P188.1-3: "Breakfast is wine, bread, smiling, sun diffracting through 
> the fine gratings of long dancers' hair, swung, flipped, never still, 
> a dazzle of violet, sorrel, saffron, emerald."
>
> P656.9-15: "Each long haircut is a passage. Hair is yet another kind 
> of modulated frequency. Assume a state of grace in which all hairs 
> were once distributed perfectly even, a time of innocence when they 
> fell perfectly straight, all over the colonel's head. Winds of the 
> day, gestures of distraction, sweat, itchings, sudden surprises, 
> three-foot falls at the edge of sleep, watched skies, remembered 
> shames, all have since written on that perfect grating."
>
> Perhaps Pynchon is riffing off of a type of grating that is used in 
> optics--from the OED online: grating, n.2, 4. _Optics._ An arrangement 
> of parallel wires in a plane, or a surface of glass or polished metal 
> ruled with a series of very close fine parallel lines, designed to 
> produce spectra by diffraction.
>
> ----------------------------------------
> > Date: Sat, 16 Jul 2011 12:22:14 +0200
> > Subject: Re: GR translation: the grating of his close-shaved skull
> > From: jstremmel at gmail.com <mailto:jstremmel at gmail.com>
> > To: mikezjing at hotmail.com <mailto:mikezjing at hotmail.com>
> > CC: pynchon-l at waste.org <mailto:pynchon-l at waste.org>
> >
> > if you run your hand across a close-shaved skull it's kind of a
> > grating sensation?
> >
> > 2011/7/16 Mike Jing <mikezjing at hotmail.com 
> <mailto:mikezjing at hotmail.com>>:
> > > P100.25-26  ..., the pale bar-light across the grating of his 
> close-shaved
> > > skull -- ...
> > >
> > > How is his close-shaved skull like a "grating"?
> > >
> > >
> > >
>
>

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