ATD question about Lake's speech (217)

[Paul Mackin]

On 4/30/2012 10:23 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:
> Matthew Cissell writes:
> Many of the first people to pass through the Cumberland gap, which
> allowed passage through the mountians, were catholics from Maryland who
> wanted to escape the increasing intolerance towards catholics there.
> Could the Traverses have crossed the same mountains, albeit further
> south and a bit later, as Mason and Dixon?
>
> Oh, check out those piled up prepositions. Somebody mentioned that in
> Munich and I think also in Lublin conferences (same person I believe);
> he argued it was a way to create disjointed syntax, or something like
> that. I just recall a british friend teasing me about american phrasal
> verbs with 3 prepostions. For example. "Y'all betta get on off down the
> road." People in Chicago do not speak like that.
>
> ciao
> mc otis
> Paul and Matthew,
> I am intrigued by the Appalachia remark, since I grew up and have
> returned to a periphery area of Appalachia---Pittsburgh, PA. (NEVER
> heard or at least never remembered the area being called Appalachian
> when I grew up----since it wanted to be Other, I'm sure. )
> I also think Pynchon is so good with language even in dialogue
> characterization---even if we think characterization is not a strength
> nor a major interest in some of the works. Look at the "what it is,
> is..." and that he has 7 (seven) OED entries for first print usage of
> certain words...[incl. "shrink"!]
> We also know Pynchon uses certain older meanings of words from the
> beginning---they are there in V. (see wiki, early pages even)
> Paul speculates so interestingly: "The Traverses must have arrived early
> in the New World, remained isolated in
> Appalachia, until moving west in the 19th Century."
> According to Vineland, the Traverse clan began (in the fictions) as
> loggers in the Pacific Northwest. Did they get there from appalachia
> in the 19th Century? The family heads WERE adventurous, courageous for
> survival at least, so very maybe. I love the possibility that TRP
> might show this in what the dictionaries call "archaic' language,
> embedding the Traverses deep into early American history silently.
> The only other writer I have read who does capture some of the historic
> speech of largely Scottish-Irish--English immigrants to the Appalachian
> area, some of whose speech patterns/usages survive, is Cormac McCarthy,
> although
> I am sure there are others (and there are some good local-area writers
> who seem realistically accurate, but they mostly capture contemporary
> talk).


Those triple prepositions Matthew mentions kind of do suggest hill 
country origins. I couldn't comment with any assurance.

Double prepositions are common in Urban American speech, though as I 
recall High school English teachers taught different.

out of

off of

P

>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com
> <mailto:alicewellintown at gmail.com>>
> To: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org <mailto:pynchon-l at waste.org>>
> Cc:
> Sent: Saturday, April 28, 2012 3:30 PM
> Subject: Re: ATD question about Lake's speech (217)
>
> What other examples of Appalachian speech by characters can we
> identify? And, is the use of "behind" to mean "in the future" or "yet
> to come" Appalachian? Maybe it's a mistake.
>
>  > The Traverses must have arrived early in the New World, remained
> isolated in
>  > Appalachia, until moving west in the 19th Century.
>  >
>  > Maybe.
>
>