Re: GR translation: you whose interdiction from her mother’s water-white love is absolute
Mike Jing
gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com
Fri Jul 7 10:08:19 CDT 2017
V8.33-9.11, V9.7-25 Osbie Feel stands in the minstrels’ gallery, holding
one of the biggest of Pirate’s bananas so that it protrudes out the fly of
his striped pajama bottoms—stroking with his other hand the great jaundiced
curve in triplets against 4/4 toward the ceiling, he acknowledges dawn with
the following:
Time to gather your arse up off the floor,
(have a bana-na)
Brush your teeth and go toddling off to war.
Wave your hand to sleepy land,
Kiss those dreams away,
Tell Miss Grable you’re not able,
Not till V-E Day, oh,
Ev’rything’ll be grand in Civvie Street
(have a bana-na)
Bubbly wine and girls wiv lips so sweet—
But there’s still the German or two to fight
So show us a smile that’s shiny bright
And then, as we may have suggested once before—
Gather yer blooming arse up off the floor!
What does "you’re not able" mean here then?
On Fri, Jul 7, 2017 at 10:50 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> agree.
>
> With "omitted" as a lack, so to speak, somehow echoed by "unable"
> --seemingly also some kind of lack...
>
> On Fri, Jul 7, 2017 at 10:47 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Yes, there's definitely a parallel structure here:
>>
>> you,
>> alone, saying *sure I know them*,
>> omitted, chuckling *count me in*,
>> unable, thinking *probably some hooker *. . .
>>
>> It seems to me that "alone", "omitted", and "unable" all describe "you".
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Jul 6, 2017 at 6:20 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Maybe this is the way we get somewhere re unable. I looked up
>>> the whole section and many phrases are in *italics which *show us
>>> something...
>>> they are words being spoken, cued
>>> by the word 'saying'....one of those sliding narrative voices as McHale
>>> (and others)
>>> wrote of.....Slothrop speaking or You (us) or both at once......
>>> ....surrounded by other
>>> narratorial words that are not spoken.
>>>
>>> "saying *sure I know them*, omitted, chuckling *count me in,*
>>> unable, thinking *probably some hooker"*
>>>
>>> So, between the spoken words a narrator--the author-- sets up paralleled
>>> connected observations.
>>> There must be a rhetorical term for that ---like parallelism? (just
>>> trying here)
>>>
>>> 'omitted, chuckling'....refers to something spoken that was omitted and
>>> laughed over, I ask???
>>> then....'unable, thinking'....perfect balanced phrases......referring to
>>> words unable to be heard or put down and
>>> only leading to thought i.e. not spoken? ??
>>>
>>> On Sat, Jul 1, 2017 at 7:45 AM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com
>>> > wrote:
>>>
>>>> V472.30-39, P480.25-35 Of all her putative fathers—Max Schlepzig and
>>>> masked extras on one side of the moving film, Franz Pökler and
>>>> certainly other pairs of hands busy through trouser cloth, that
>>>> Alpdrücken Night, on the other—Bianca is closest, this last possible
>>>> moment below decks here behind the ravening jackal, closest to you who
>>>> came in blinding color, slouched alone in your own seat, never
>>>> threatened along any rookwise row or diagonal all night, you whose
>>>> interdiction from her mother’s water-white love is absolute, you,
>>>> alone, saying sure I know them, omitted, chuckling count me in,
>>>> unable, thinking probably some hooker . . . She favors you, most of
>>>> all. You’ll never get to see her. So somebody has to tell you.
>>>>
>>>> Is this interdiction between you and her mother's love, i.e. you are
>>>> interdicted by something else from her mother's love, or is it that
>>>> you are interdicted by her mother's love for her from doing something?
>>>>
>>>> Also, what does "water-white" imply? And what does "unable" mean here
>>>> exactly?
>>>> -
>>>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
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