BEER Group Read. Bruce Winterslow and Vyrva McElmo

[Monte Davis]

And of course the competition in GR of transfiguring light -- the light on
the white Congregational steeples aimed at heaven from the Berkshires -- and
annihilating light that may be about to burst through the theater ceiling,
or may just be a projectionist's error.

If one could bring only one insight of Einstein's physics to AtD, it should
be that *light does not experience time*. In our frame of reference a photon
(or light wave) takes billions of years to cross the observable universe. In
its own, no less privileged, no time passes. 

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On Behalf
Of John Bailey
Sent: Monday, October 14, 2013 8:15 AM
To: Fiona Shnapple
Cc: pynchon -l
Subject: Re: BEER Group Read. Bruce Winterslow and Vyrva McElmo

I'm not sold on the idea of light as a positive in Pynchon's writing,
however - light is the bomb blast, the fateful morning, the quelling of
shadows, the constant roar of the sun Slothrop is finally illumined to in
its unusual absence. It's always night, or else we wouldn't need light.
Light is closer to Blicero.

And light and space-time are inextricably linked in AtD, as far as this
physics-impoverished reader can tell. To find alternatives to history
involves travelling through darkness.

On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 11:03 PM, Fiona Shnapple <fionashnapple at gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> John,
>
> Thanks for these insights and inter textual connections.
>
> On Monday, October 14, 2013, John Bailey wrote:
>>
>> Bleeding Edge seems time-obsessed. We might even get [SPOILER] the 
>> origins of AtD's trespassers, maybe not. I'm also thinking of M&D's 
>> clock conversation, in which they're charged with keeping different 
>> geo-times while occupying the same space. Seems pertinent. Seems like 
>> something P has been trying to do (and also problematising) his whole 
>> career. BE is trying to render a time-space (NY 2001) both ruptured 
>> and continuous.
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 14, 2013 at 10:18 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
wrote:
>> > Bruce Slow as Winter? and Vyrva, physically slow, 'a West Coast' 
>> > thing, "not nearly time-obsessed enough".
>> >
>> > Then Pynchon jumps back in time---the looseness, the looseness; "he 
>> > can do it anytime"-- to "before [Maxine and Vyrva] got to know each
other"
>> > when Maxine saw her as a California type who must surely drink 
>> > herbal tea.
>> >
>> > Mediated seeing. Seeing in stereotypes. Even our 'fraud detective' 
>> > of some supposed acuity.
>> > -
>> > Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>> -
>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l

-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l