GR translation: Arab With A Big Greasy Nose

[Mike Jing]

Thanks everyone for responding.

On Tue, May 24, 2016 at 3:45 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen
<lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:
>
> And Sam Jaffe appears in Bleeding Edge!
>
> "'This is me?' Ernie said when he saw the photo. 'I look like Sam Jaffe.'
>  'A friend of yours, Mr. Tarnow?'
>  'A movie actor.' Explaining to Efrem Zimbalist Jr. here how in The Day the
> Earth Stood Still (1951) Sam Jaffe, playing Professor Barnhardt, the
> smartest man in the world, Einstein only different, after writing some
> advanced equations all over the blackboard in his study, steps out for a
> minute. The extraterrestrial Klaatu shows up looking for him and finds the
> boardful of symbols, like the worst algebra class you were ever in, notices
> what seems to be a mistake down in the middle of it, erases something and
> writes something else in, then leaves. When the Professor comes back, he
> immediately spots the change to his equations and stands there kind of
> beaming at the blackboard. It was some such expression that had crossed
> Ernie's face just as the covered federal shutter fell.
>  'I've heard of that movie,' recalled this Windust party, 'pacifist
> propaganda in the depths of the Cold War, I believe it was flagged as
> potentially Communist-inspired,'
>  'Yeah, you people blacklisted Sam Jaffe too. He wasn't a Communist, but he
> refused to testify. For years no studio would hire him. He made a living
> teaching math in high school. Strangely enough.'
>  'He taught high school? Who would've been disloyal enough to hire him?'"
>  'This is 2001, Maxeleh,' Ernie now shaking his head back and forth, 'the
> Cold War is supposed to be over, how can these people not have changed or
> moved on, where is such a terrible inertia coming from?'
>  'You always used to say their time hasn't passed, it's yet to come.'"
>
> pp. 100-101
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASsNtti1XZs
>
> Klaatu's speech sounds indeed a little bit "Communist-inspired", no?
>
>
>
> On 23.05.2016 20:52, Simon Bryquer wrote:
>
> Being ill (dracunculiasis) and to perform on is vomiting on someone or
> something. Key :Army.
>
>
>
> As per the following:
>
>
>
> Perhaps this has been answered before – we’re talking about Kipling here.
> The ‘Fuzzy-Wuzzy’ poem of 19th  century British soldier view of Hadendoa
> warriors in Sudan.
>
>
>
> Gary Grant and all that refers to the movie ‘Gunga Din’ (also a Kipling poem
> made into a movie) played by Sam Jaffe, who I vaguely recall could be
> described in that movie as ‘Arab With A Big Greasy Nose’ though it’s all
> about India.
>
>
>
> BTW Sam Jaffe was great in the John Houston movie ‘Asphalt Jungle’ ---- also
> I believe this was Marilyn Monroe first speaking role, though she did not
> get any screen credit. She plays a slightly mentally off babysitter --- and
> she was extremely good.
>
>
>
> Maybe the key words here : dracunculiasis and elephant medicine
>
>
>
> A parasitic infection caused by drinking flea invested water and causes one
> to vomit – to perform on here might be vomiting on one or many in the
> crowded army in battle.
>
>
>
> I would conclude to perform on is vomiting on someone or many.
>
>
>
>
> From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On Behalf
> Of Monte Davis
> Sent: Monday, May 23, 2016 12:30 PM
> To: Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> Cc: Pynchon Mailing List <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Subject: Re: GR translation: Arab With A Big Greasy Nose
>
>
>
> I take the "wistful classic" to be a comic song. I don't know the song, or
> know that Pynchon had any existing song in mind rather than a tease. So
> "perform" is wide open to your suggested definition... or to a musical
> performance (like squeezing a clown's rubber nose)... or to a sexual
> performance (details depending on culture, other organs involved, and how
> one feels about noses).
>
>
>
> On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 11:54 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> Resurrecting this old post nobody replied to back in 2011. A search in
> the archives shows that this has been asked a few times, but no one
> had an answer. The problems is that I still have to figure out how to
> translate "perform on". From the OED:
>
> 6. intr.
> b. euphem. Esp. of a child or a pet: to urinate or defecate.
>
> Does this make sense to anyone else given the context?
>
> On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 4:19 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> P14.5-13   In 1935 he had his first episode outside any condition of
>> known sleep—it was during his Kipling Period, beastly Fuzzy-Wuzzies
>> far as eye could see, dracunculiasis and Oriental sore rampant among
>> the troops, no beer for a month, wireless being jammed by other Powers
>> who would be masters of these horrid blacks, God knows why, and all
>> folklore broken down, no Gary Grant larking in and out slipping
>> elephant medicine in the punchbowls out here . .. not even an Arab
>> With A Big Greasy Nose to perform on, as in that wistful classic every
>> tommy’s heard . . .
>>
>> What is this classic with "an Arab With A Big Greasy Nose"?  And what
>> do they want to perform on him?
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