Parse
Markekohut
markekohut at yahoo.com
Sun Sep 8 06:01:55 CDT 2013
'' deep reading' makes us smarter and nicer, sez science.
Sent from my iPad
On Sep 8, 2013, at 1:20 AM, Mitch Nisonoffm <mitchnis at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Pynchon is a careful writer and GR starts off with grammatical exactitude, and perhaps especially in his longer Proustian sentences. I found that careful grammatical parsing, and not quick (re)readings, reveals meaning. Let me posit that the other old timers can have their fun elaborations; real fun and enlightenment comes to those of us old timers who look to discern this writer's singular intent and not the multitudes of readers' quick and easy takeaways.
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
> On Sep 8, 2013, at 12:09 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Thank, Mitch, for supporting my longstanding posit that parsing GR is a worthy endeavor. Other old timers have disagreed.
>>
>> On Saturday, September 7, 2013, Mitch Nisonoffm wrote:
>>> It makes more sense to parse this long sentence this way:
>>> ... certain trestles of blackened wood have moved slowly by overhead ... [and] of maturing rust, developing through those emptying days brilliant and deep, especially at dawn, with blue shadows to seal its passage, to try to bring events to Absolute Zero . . .
>>>
>>>
>>> What is this "coral-like and mysteriously vital growth"? What is "developing through those emptying days brilliant and deep"? Is it the rust? Why are the days "emptying", and yet "brilliant and
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPa
>>>
>>> On Sep 7, 2013, at 11:00 PM, Steve Maas <tyronemullet at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> It seems to me that in "to seal its passage," "its" refers to the carriage. I would hat "developing " to refer to the smells, including the distinctive smell of rust. "Blue shadows" - hmmm, maybe simply poetic license?
>>>> Nte
>>>> Steve Maasnd
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> From: jonfpost at gmail.com
>>>> Date: Sat, 7 Sep 2013 20:53:38 -0500
>>>> Subject: GR p.4 "with blue shadows to seal its passage"
>>>> To: pynchon-l at waste.org
>>>>
>>>> I'm attempting a very close rereading of GR and have already come upon a puzzling knot that has stumped me: in the long sentence at the top of p. 4, I'm not sure how to interpret "...maturing rust, developing through those emptying days brilliant and deep, especially at dawn, with blue shadows to seal its passage, to try to bring events to Absolute Zero ..."
>>>>
>>>> --What is "developing"? the various smells or the rust?
>>>> --What does the "its" in "it's passage" refer to? the dawn? the development of the rust?
>>>> --And so, what are the "blue shadows"?
>>>>
>>>> -J
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