Names in AtD - Frank

[Matthew Cissell]

Thanks for all the input. I am aware that when it comes to the association game in literature it's a bit of 'your allusion vs. mine', but forget all that semiotic drift and the free-play of the signifier. As Cowart indicated long ago there is an art to TP's allusions.

Yes, there are many Frank names that TP could be playing off of, but does anyone really think there is a good case for it to be an allusion to Frank (Henry Fonda bad guy in the western) or soem of the other Franks that were mentioned? Where is the argument in its favor? And no, I don't think it's short for Frankenstein.

Dear Alice, I aint Joshin', Jamesin' or anything else, I think an inquiry into Frank's name is not invalid in discussion of the book. Now, as much as I admire your erudition, Alice, maybe we could consider that TP is drawing on a book you're unfamiliar with? Do you really think TP wants the reader to look to Frank Norris or Frank Kermode for that matter? How would that fit in? Take a look at the novel The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists before you reject my supposition.

I also do not think I have answered my own question with the mention of Frank being a common name for a 'common' (meaning regular, normal, average) guy. 'Normal' names for 'normal' people in TP? C'mon.


sincerely

mc otis



________________________________
From: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
To: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org> 
Sent: Tuesday, May 7, 2013 2:44 AM
Subject: Re: Names in AtD - Frank



Ah, Matt C is juss joshing wit us. You ever heard of that novel or that author? I sure as hell aint never heard of him or it. Frank Norris, man. Now don't tell me that you aint heard of Norris. 



On Mon, May 6, 2013 at 3:07 PM, Bekah <bekah0176 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

I think MC answered his own question -   "…. then there is Frank, a very common name."     Frank is just a totally common name back then - and he was the common guy amongst the western Traverses and  Fresnos and Kindreds.  He didn't go east like Kit or become a card-shark like Reef.    Frank is the one who has a goodly chunk of the Western episodes - the cowboy good-guy who avenges Webb's death and sticks around the southwest from Denver to central Mexico.
>
>Bekah
>who feels a reread coming on -  (LOVE that book)
>
>
>On May 6, 2013, at 2:58 AM, Ruth Flatscher <ruflatsch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> well, Frank actually does have a very literal meaning, too... at least in English.
>> Haven't got around AtD yet, so I don't know whether it fits the character or has a rather sarcastic effect.
>> cheers,
>> R
>>
>> ps - btw, PKDick also has a protagonist named Frank in "The Man in the High Castle"...
>>
>>
>> On 6 May 2013 11:50, Matthew Cissell <macissell at yahoo.es> wrote:
>> We know that the names that TP uses are anything but inconsequential, they point to something if only we take the time to think about what. In AtD most of the Traverses have names that are less than common and would seem to have some greater value than a mere label for a character (Webb, Lake, Reef, etc) but then there is Frank, a very common name. Why?
>>
>> I can't claim to have THE answer but I have an idea. First, we know that the book is composed in large part by drawing on a wide range of genres (what have been deemed "narrative clusters") and that these literary echoes are important for the book. Clearly one theme is the working class family and the social literature it belongs to.
>> So I looked at Raymond Williams' Writing in Society, specifically The Ragged Arsed Philanthropists. It's about the novel The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, written by an Irishman and rejected by publishers for its ideological content, whose protagonist is named... you guessed it, Frank.
>>
>> Does anybody want to add to this? Any other ideas for the name Frank?
>>
>>
>> ciao
>> mc otis
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Mag. Ruth Flatscher
>> Department of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany, University of Vienna
>> Institute of Botany, University of Innsbruck
>
>