M&D - Chapter 12 - pp 122-124

[alice malice]

> And the Ellicott tries to the Sheldon about insanity at St. Helena in folks other than Maskelyne but he's interrupted as it’s time for the Sheldon Clock to be crated up and stowed aboard ship.  The narrator comments on their relationship to the ocean,  its “Wave-beats”  and the attraction of “Synchrony.”   The Sheldon says he doesn’t much care for ships.

How does insanity influence time?

International Society for the Study of Time
J.T. Fraser
http://www.studyoftime.org/ContentPage.aspx?ID=28

Also, while P's use of the clocks here may have many purposes, one may
be to make it easy for the reader; by making the clocks subjects
Pynchon makes it easy for the reader to understand what the clocks do.
It is easy for us to understand through story, and much tougher for us
to understand through description. So, by making the clocks the
subjects of sentences, agents, by giving them personalities, habits ,
abilities, etc., P makes it easy for the reader.
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Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l