BEg2 chapter 4 summary part 2

[Mark Kohut]

Yes, an excellent summary but the danger is it does not fit Pynchon's
general vision. Imho.
We must try to see that too.

On Mon, Nov 15, 2021 at 8:17 PM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

> Agree with Keith. Excellent summary of basic action and information.
> Breaking it into bits helps and fits P’s general stye.
>
> > On Nov 15, 2021, at 8:08 PM, Keith Davis <kbob42 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Great work!
> >
> > linktr.ee/keithdavis
> >
> >> On Nov 15, 2021, at 6:28 PM, Michael Bailey <
> michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> Shawn the emotherapist claims knowledge from the Far East, but Maxine
> knows
> >> his real experience, though not expertise, is with surfing.
> >>
> >> Maxine’s session with Shawn revolves around Shawn rather than Maxine.
> >>
> >> Shawn is irritated at the Taliban for blowing up the
> >> thousand-five-hundred-year-old Buddha statues. He lets his tongue run
> free,
> >> conflating the fundamentalist Taliban with Islam itself.
> >>
> >> In fact, Shawn apparently spends the whole session on this rant, with
> >> Maxine nudging him towards calmness.
> >>
> >> Looking forward to a Brady Bunch marathon, he ends the session early
> with
> >> no therapeutic efforts other than an insincere query for her thoughts
> about
> >> the Brady Bunch episode where Jan gets a wig
> >> https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0531167/
> >>
> >>
> >> Maxine picks up Otis and Fiona at the Kugelblitz School, but Ziggy is
> >> headed for Krav Maga class with his classmate Nigel and Nigel’s sitter.
> >>
> >>
> >> The rest of the chapter, in Maxine’s apartment, consists of
> >>
> >> a)settling Otis and Fiona in to watch The Aggro Hour, with non-sugar
> soda
> >> and health food Cheetos.
> >>
> >> b) Ziggy coming home from Krav Maga with a “ haze of early-adolescent
> sex
> >> angst” engendered by the female instructor, Emma Levin, and indulged by
> her
> >> ex-Mossad boyfriend Naftali “who will kill anybody even looks at her
> sideways,
> >> unless maybe it’s a kid who can’t help having some preadolescent
> longing.”
> >>
> >> c) Maxine walking in on Fiona showing Ziggy and Otis the new
> first-person
> >> shooter game her father has created. At first scandalized, Maxine’s
> lured
> >> in & comes to appreciate the way it gives her an opportunity to
> disappear
> >> ill-mannered yuppies and give their children up for adoption.
> >>
> >> d) Convo with Vyrva about the latter’s meeting which was with Gabriel
> Ice.
> >> Ice offered to buy her husband & his partner’s software, which they
> called
> >> Deep Archer. Apparently there’s a piece of it that can enhance
> >> untraceability, and that’s the piece that Ice is willing to buy the
> whole
> >> thing to get.
> >> Maxine reflects on how secure privacy inevitably leads to abuses.
> >> Vyrva relates that the partners are both torn on whether to accept the
> >> offer, or to release the code for free.
> >> Maxine understands that choice is not a no-brainer, that money isn’t
> always
> >> desirable: “…above a critical amount, it’s all bad.”
> >>
> >> e) the last part of the chapter relates Mrs McElmo’s Beanie Baby
> >> obsession/side hustle. Ostensibly collecting them for Fiona, she is much
> >> more the mover in this hobby, and thinks it’s a great investment.
> >> Ziggy quite maturely (and out of Vyrva’s presence) critiques the
> pitfalls
> >> of Beanie Babies as an investment: moth and rust and wear and tear - and
> >> concludes that Vyrva, at least as regards Beanie Babies, is crazy.
> >> --
> >> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>
>
>
> --
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>