M&D Deep Duck Ch. 3: Innocent merriment

[David Morris]

This is a seminal passage.  Better than a screamiming sky! or at least
equal.

On Monday, January 12, 2015, John Bailey <sundayjb at gmail.com> wrote:

> "Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever I find
> myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up
> the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get
> such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to
> prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and
> methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time
> to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and
> ball."
>
> On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 11:02 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
> > Makes sense to me.
> >
> > On Monday, January 12, 2015, Mark Wright <washoepete at gmail.com
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >>
> >> He sees his own drop: a latent suicide steeling his nerve.
> >>
> >> On Monday, January 12, 2015, Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> 15.10: "Mason explains, though without his precise reason for it, that,
> >>> for the past Year or more, it has been his practice to attend the
> Friday
> >>> Hangings at that melancholy place ..." (Tyburn)
> >>>
> >>> Anybody care to venture a "precise reason"? This first meeting is in
> 1760
> >>> or 1761, so his habit might date to his wife Rebekah's death in 1759
> >>> (although later we'll get reasons to think he had tended to the
> >>> Melancholick well before that). And yes, the Tyburn hangings were an
> >>> acknowledged Sight of London.
> >>>
> >>> Is that enough to explain it? Mason is rather gentle, neither sadistic
> >>> nor vindictive; I for one don't see an obvious or direct connection
> between
> >>> mouning and a desire to watch excutions.
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://waste.org/pipermail/pynchon-l/attachments/20150112/5755f594/attachment.html>