GR translation: demolition man

[Paul Mackin]

On 11/9/2012 4:15 PM, James Kyllo wrote:
> No doubt the demolition answers are correct, but I can't help but 
> think that the expression "knee trembler" has some relevance too.. 
>  the "spoon between two cups" being easy to view as phallic symbolically.

Also the dishes and the dishwater--you can wash yours in mine anytime 
just whistle.

We have to accept this sort of thing in Pynchon--if we can't, we 
gravitate toward James Wood's view of him as meaning everything and 
therefore nothing.

Is it an unconscious impulse he can't control? Is it indecision as to 
what he wants to say?

Is it the truth that there IS no truth? Or a million truths?  Or that 
one truth contradicts another truth.

Life of is overdetermined.  In life we find not one truth but many, 
infinitely many.   Pynchon's writing conveys that great mystery.

Or not.

P
>
>
> On Fri, Nov 9, 2012 at 7:42 PM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at verizon.net 
> <mailto:mackin.paul at verizon.net>> wrote:
>
>     On 11/8/2012 2:02 AM, jochen stremmel wrote:
>
>         I think what Pynchon refers to here is more general, not only
>         in the
>         context of WW II or the high and low contact. It's about "a
>         repetition
>         high and low", low like the malignant pun a filthy, mocking
>         scoundrel
>         might make and high like a sympathetic magic.
>
>         It's about playing with words and images, similes, metaphors.
>         Like the
>         demolition man and the Trembler he sees in a spoon between a
>         glass and
>         a plate, if he has to do the dishes.
>
>     Going beyond the specific examples, we might want also to note
>     that this superstitious and magical thinking is meant to exemplify
>     impurity, the opposite of what the second level is supposed to
>     produce or demonstrate?
>
>     Thinking that contact of the spoon with the cup might produce an
>     explosion--or that a coffee brand name by mere name association
>     will bring forth a cruel lady--are pollutions of thought. (of
>     course in this case there IS a cruel lady)
>
>     And outside the Kabbalistic framework, the interrelatedness of all
>     things for the paranoiac is suggested.  To the paranoiac
>     everything is connected.  At least in Pynchon. Not sure how that
>     applied to Pudding, but still . . . .
>
>
>     P
>
>
>         2012/11/7 Monte Davis <montedavis at verizon.net
>         <mailto:montedavis at verizon.net>>:
>
>             Jochen is correct about “demolition man” in  general, but
>             in a WWII context
>             I think it means Explosive Ordnance Disposal,  someone who
>             *disarms* bombs.
>             A “trembler” is a vibration-sensitive switch, its central
>             tongue (an
>             electrical contact) closing the circuit if it touches
>             either the “high”
>             contact above or the “low” contact beneath.
>
>
>
>             From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org
>             <mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org>
>             [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org
>             <mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org>] On Behalf
>             Of Mike Jing
>             Sent: Wednesday, November 07, 2012 2:22 AM
>             To: Pynchon Mailing List
>             Subject: GR translation: demolition man
>
>
>
>             P234.35-235.4  In the second antechamber is an empty red
>             tin that held
>             coffee. The brand name is Savarin. He understands that it
>             means to say
>             “Severin.” Oh, the filthy, the mocking scoundrel. . . .
>             But these are not
>             malignant puns against an intended sufferer so much as a
>             sympathetic magic,
>             a repetition high and low of some prevailing form (as, for
>             instance, no sane
>             demolition man at his evening dishwater will wash a spoon
>             between two cups,
>             or even between a glass and a plate, for fear of the
>             Trembler it implies . .
>             . because it’s a trembler-tongue he really holds, poised
>             between its two
>             fatal contacts, in fingers aching with having been so
>             suddenly reminded). .
>             . .
>
>             What is the "demolition man" mentioned here?  Why the fear
>             of tremblers?
>             What is a trembler anyway?
>
>             Also, what is the meaning of "high and low" in "a
>             repetition high and low"?
>
>
>
>
>
> -- 
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