BtZ42, 21: Slothrop backstory in UK

[Mark Kohut]

Weisenburger says Part one of GR begins on  Dec 18, 1944.
[*Companion,* Introduction,
p10 ] Which means three years before would be right after Pearl Harbor---if
he meant exactly 3 years and did not round up 2 years 10 or 11 months--or
round down from 3 years a month or two for that matter,  as we often do
when we comment on knowing someone, esp as "lots of stuff..is getting
blurry" .

An early Pynchon reader, explainer, Thomas Slade, sez Slothrop was in
London for a year. I read that book back in the day----published as a mass
market paperback, ladies & gentlemen, amazing but true--but lots of stuff
in it is really blurry now and I think I must have internalized that time
period, whether Slade is right or wrong, because I have always assumed
Slothrop was only there in London at that desk at ACHTUNG a shorter time
than the time he knew Tantivy. About a year maybe, Mr. Internalizer
self-jokes.

P. 22 Miller edition of GR: "..and Tantivy about to laugh or snort oh God
across the wood Atlantic of their table."
"Atlantics aplenty there have been these three years, often rougher, etc"
 ...
I have read this, perhaps superficially, as indicating many desks (or
distances) over those three years.

Here is a snippet where Slade's time assertion is mentioned. Neither in
this snippet, nor in the blurring of possible memory, can I remember if it
is backed up or simply assumed in his book.
---
https://books.google.com/books?id=pUH_AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA70&dq=When+was+Slothrop+in+London?&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjHnLurpvrLAhXC5CYKHf5zCOgQ6AEIPTAE#v=onepage&q=When%20was%20Slothrop%20in%20London%3F&f=false

Since The Blitz usually refers, it seems, to all the sorties, I have
assumed Slothrop is here seeing the V-2 bombings as a 'second Blitz'
although I guess History distinguishes differently.

War, bombardment, blurs the mind almost totally, one might say as we meet
the war-harried, mostly worried Slothrop.


On Tue, Apr 5, 2016 at 7:38 PM, Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:

> "A lot of stuff prior to 1944 is getting blurry now. He can remember the
> first Blitz only as a long spell of good luck."
>
> So Slothrop was in London for the first Blitz, usually dated 7 Sep 1940 to
> 11 May 1941, heaviest for the first 2-3 months. That means a minimum of 3
> 1/2 years -- 4 yrs and 2 months if he witnessed the whole thing, which is
> closer to the feeling I get here.
>
> Keep in mind that the US didn't enter WWII until Dec 1941... Lend-Lease
> cooperation began after Mar 1941... and even the dodgy swap of US
> destroyers for rights at UK bases in the Western Hemisphere was Sep 1940.
>
> Compare also to "these three years" farther down the page, applied to
> Slothrop's friendship with Tantivy and the shared office at ACHTUNG. Which
> would take that back to Nov. 1941, again before US entry into the war and
> *long* before -- historically -- there was any special focus on "technical
> intelligence" re "Northern Germany," i.e. V-2s.
>
> No note on this discrepancy -- or at least loose end -- at the Pynchon
> Wiki or in Weisenburger's Companion.
>
> So... Does GR explain anywhere what US Army Lt. Slothrop was *doing* in
> London in 1940-1941? It's not necessarily a ***CLUE*** - even without
> formal alliance, even in peacetime, likely allies with shared strategic
> concerns often maintain small military missions in each other's capitals.
>
> But given what we'll later learn about plans for Slothrop going way
> back... maybe we're *supposed* to wonder about it, hmmm?
>
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