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[Mark Kohut]

[image: Martin Paul Eve bio photo]Martin Paul Eve

Professor of Literature, Technology and Publishingat Birkbeck, University
of London
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Thomas Pynchon, from S-Gerät to Y-Gerät
<https://eve.gd/2021/08/19/thomas-pynchon-from-s-ger%C3%A4t-to-y-ger%C3%A4t/>

One of the core plot devices (in so far as there is a plot) in Thomas
Pynchon’s 1973 novel, *Gravity’s Rainbow*, is the S-Gerät: the Schwarzgerät
or “black device”, made from the plastic Imipolex G.

While working on another project (on the history of television), I found a
curious set of projects from the war, designated Y-Gerät and X-Gerät, which
are part of the so-called Battle of the Beams
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beams> but that, to my
knowledge, haven’t been explored in Pynchon scholarship.

“The German air force was operating a directional beam system called
“Y-Gerät” aimed at the London area. It sent out two separate transmissions
to fix the aircraft’s bearing and range from the beacon.” – Abramson,
Albert, The History of Television, 1880 to 1941 (Jefferson N.C.: McFarland
& Co., 1987), pp. 268-9.

I don’t know what influence these had on Pynchon, if any. However, it’s
always fun to note an unspotted(?) real-world connection to this novel.