M&D - Chapter 11 pp 109-110

[Mark Kohut]

p. 113 A little Luddite joke?
"These frightful Machines!" she pretends to lament'---shall our Deaths
now, as well as our Lives, be rul'd by the Philosophers, and their
Army of Mechanicks?" .....Or a futuristic 20th Century Look Forward?
Or both, of course.

On Mon, Feb 23, 2015 at 2:04 PM,  <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:
> I wouldn't describe this as "unreliable," but I don't think it's something Cherrycoke is saying aloud. The year after Rebekah's death is something Cherrycoke has no personal knowledge of. He may or may not have personal knowledge of the "night-world of Rakes and Whores," but I still read this as internal musing, not storytelling to his  audience.
>
> Laura
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> From: Monte Davis
>
> Sent: Feb 23, 2015 1:51 PM
>
> To: kelber
>
> Cc: jochen stremmel , Becky Lindroos , pynchon -l
>
> Subject: Re: M&D - Chapter 11 pp 109-110
>
>
>
> Are you reading this passage on p. 110 as unreliable because the paragraph ends with Wicks drifting off and being recalled by "Uncle, Uncle"?
> "The year after Rebekah's death was
> treacherous ground for Mason, who was as apt to cross impulsively by Ferry
> into the Bosom of Wapping, and another night of joyless low
> debauchery, as to attend Routs in Chelsea, where nothing was available betwixt
> Eye-Flirtation, and the Pox. In lower-situated imitations of the
> Hellfire Club, he hurtl'd carelessly
> along some of Lust's less-frequented footpaths, ever further,
> he did not escape noting, from Pleasure.."
> If so, what makes anything after mid-106 more reliable? If it's reliable, whether from Wicks or Pynchon, what do you make of something so at variance with almost everything else we learn of Mason-as-widower?
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
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