AtD - Chapter 27 - Section 2 (337-343): Hook deployment

[alice malice]

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On Fri, Aug 15, 2014 at 1:14 PM, alice malice <alicewmalice at gmail.com> wrote:
> Note that the Con often signs his acts before the hook is used to hook
> them. So he hooks them before they get hooked. Interesting business
> model.
>
> On Fri, Aug 15, 2014 at 1:07 PM, alice malice <alicewmalice at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Yes, of course, in the given sentence the word "Hook" (capitalized by
>> the author) is surely the implement deployed.
>>
>> This literal reading, while an important first step, is just that, a
>> step in what turns out to be, as is so often the case with Pynchon, a
>> long and nearly exhausting series of joaks and puns and so on.
>>
>> In most cases, then as now, the Hook is not physically, nor is it
>> literally, but only proverbially, as a common reference, or
>> figuratively deployed.
>>
>> In a Chuck Jones cartoon, Bugs will use his cane to hook Daffy Duck,
>> who, after ducking the deployed tomatoes and onions will be yanked off
>> the stage only to be replaced by the ever-popular Bunny. But the
>> cartoon works through a reversal of the figurative, so the cane or
>> hook is there, literally deployed.
>>
>> But  AGTD is no cartoon. Sure, we are in Tn Pan Alley. Sure, the hook
>> was, physically employed in the theater and so forth...
>>
>>
>> But there is so much Hooking going on in this section that it seems we
>> are meant to look closer for non-literal meanings.
>>
>>
>> So, who gets hooked and who does the hooking here? And, why is the
>> Hook fateful. Hook is a pun and title of song and the catchy catch
>> that catches and has cat sured your tongue and your ears too, to boot.
>>
>> How one translates these clever puns is beyond me.
>>
>> Shakespeare must give translators fits and what about Chaucer whose
>> triple pun at the tail of the Miller's Tale, where the Tally of a sum
>> for a Tail (sex) or a Tale is measured in rhymes and sums of puns,
>> still gets the young scholars blushing.
>>
>> On Wed, Aug 13, 2014 at 11:52 AM, Michel <bulb at vheissu.net> wrote:
>>> '[Con McVeety] ... lurking backstage, waiting for the fateful Hook
>>> deployment )´ p. 342
>>>
>>> What does 'Hook' refer to? Makes no sense to, right now, Pynchonwiki has
>>> nothing yet on it...
>>>
>>> Michel.
>>>
>>>
>>> -
>>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
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