BEg2 Chapter 3 Deseret

[Allen Ruch]

Oh man yeah—Ernie is right. I have a friend in the State Department, and he always jokes about how many Mormons are in the government at every level. And I agree about the architecture. Mormon architecture is often fantastic—as in something out of a "fantasy"—and pointy, oh so pointy; but hardly baroque and filled with gargoyles.

I don't think the LDS has as much of a "police state" as they used to—they have eased up a little on this front, possibly passing the baton to Scientology. There's been a lot more openness and questioning in the faith these days. Even a sense of humor at times. However, the more sectarian Mormons—the ones who split from the LDS and keep compounds—hoo boy, watch out. 

And also, making up tribes and inventing prehistory seems pretty de rigueur for all religions, including nationalism, communism, and capitalism. 

AND DON'T KNOCK MAGIC DECODER GLASSES!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9rrgJXfLns

Quail

On 11/12/21, 2:46 PM, "Joseph Tracy" <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

    Cool stuff. Recalls to me  the Mormon mafia in Inherent Vice, or the Mormons who show up in ATD in unflattering ways. The proposed nation of Deseret is particularly interesting. It didn’t turn up in my search but feels important. Am I recalling correctly  that Ernie icluded Mormons?... oh here it is:
        “   But look at the U.S. security apparatus, these guys are WASPs, Mormons, Skull and Bones, secretive by nature. Trained, sometimes since birth, never to run off at the mouth. If discipline exists anywhere, it’s among them. So of course it’s possible.”  Possible here referring to possible inside job.
    So here in the Deseret may be an outpost of the Mormon Kingdom and it is the staging ground for that weird rooftop video. The choice of gothic  design might seem weird but Mormons have a thing for ultra pointy architecture, I think to directly inject their prayers into the heavenly mainline. The other thing about Mormonism is the police state secrecy and the close watch they pay on  Mormon believers. This fits with Maxines unsatisfied curiosity. Anyway Mormonism also plays as a qintessential  patriarchal ‘American’ religion. Making up tribes out of vaguely Anglo biblical sounding names and inventing a prehistoy for the new world that safely distances it from anything real. Plus magic decoder  glasses for the prophet. 
    The idea of a state within a state, the deep state, coordinated with the deep web of surveillance growing from the internet all fits into ideas and images Pynchon has been working with for years.  




    > On Nov 12, 2021, at 9:41 AM, Allen Ruch <quail at shipwrecklibrary.com> wrote:
    > 
    > I know it’s been mentioned here that “Deseret” means “honeybee” in Mormonspeak. I didn’t see the following discussed, so I thought I’d chime in:
    > 
    > The term itself (pronounced with a hard “t,” not like a French word: Gentiles often make that mistake) comes from the Book of Mormon, and means “honeybee” in the language of the Jaredites. Why is this interesting? Because the Jaredites were exiled to America after the fall of the Tower of Babel, so we have the whole “tower” connection there. Also, the Jaredite language received a pass from God on the whole scramble-thing, so it still remains pure. An unbroken vessel of language, so to speak.
    > 
    > Deseret also has a significant political meaning. Back in the 1840s, when the Mormons (some might argue reasonably) wanted to secede from the Unite States, they proposed to create the Nation of Deseret. (Sometimes this is referred to as a kingdom, and sometimes a republic. It depends on who’s doing the proposing.) In any event, they did declare a State of Deseret, which was larger than Utah and had its own flag. It didn’t last too long, as the federal government took a dim view of such expansionist ideas when coming from people even crazier than themselves.
    > 
    > To this day, the idea of a separate Deseret has a romantic, nostalgic ring to some Mormons, and to many genre writers as well! There have been dozens of independent Deserets in various alternative history narratives.
    > 
    > And possibly most interesting to Pynchon fans, there’s George Watt’s “Deseret alphabet.” Back in the late 1840s, the Mormons devised a replacement for the English alphabet. It’s too complicated to get into here, but you can have fun here:
    > 
    > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deseret_alphabet
    > 
    > http://www.deseretalphabet.org
    > 
    > Needless to say, this “Mormon code” has intrigued many people to this day. Some may even know it by heart! Some people on this very List, perhaps?
    > 
    > And finally, just to point out, Pynchon calling the hotel “The Deseret” brings to mind the Mormons, sure, in some ways the ultimate “white Americans:” and yet, unlike WASPs, they have a word for non-Mormons that Maxine would understand: Gentiles.
    > 
    > —Quail
    > 
    > 
    > --
    > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l