GR translation: rolling right behind

[David Morris]

However sliced, the focus is on a completely unexpected surprise
interruption of the carnal pleasures of sexual revelry and nose-picking.

And I think we are again supposed to link it to the reversal of sensory
time experience imagined by Slothrup in his vision of a rocket landing
centered on the crown of his head as he pursues his own “Wrens” in the
streets of London.

On Sun, Apr 24, 2022 at 12:30 PM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

> >>  suddenly in the sky, miles behind his back and up the river
> >> mementomori a sharp crack and a heavy explosion, rolling right behind,
> >> almost like a clap of thunder.
>
> Does anyone else wonder why  there is a comma before rolling right behind
> as well as after? This is my only problem with D Morris’s interpretation
> which seems very sensible and obvious otherwise.  Why not just a single
> comma after behind? To me the punctuation makes it seem like it reaches
> further back in the sentence or is more inclusive than the heavy explosion.
> Could it refer to the “river memento mori”, which is a peculiar turn of
> phrase, or perhaps to the sky, or to the moment he was reaching to pick his
> nose?
>   And... What does "up the river mementomori" mean? Here’s an explosion in
> the sky and miles behind him  which locates it in space; an explosion
> happening  just as he was reaching to pick his nose, which makes it
> temporal; but also an explosion happening up a river here labeled "remember
> you will die”. The presence of this river seems to move the explosion
> outside of, or behind, normal spacetime. It’s as though he has a thread or
> flow of memory, (this is a memory of last Sept), that is devoted to
> reminding him of his mortality that goes further back than this event  and
> it is rolling along behind him, intruding like a clap of thunder. Like a
> clap of thunder but not quite; parallel with a real explosion, but more
> than that.
>   Giving more importance to the “river mementomori” asks me as reader if
> this is a shared, even universal, phenomena.  It  also amplifies the
> mystery of Slothrop’s past, his Calvinist influences and his varied roles:
> as individual making sense of his life, as object of experimentation, and
> as focus of study by others trying to understand his connection to rocket
> strikes.
>
>
> > On Apr 24, 2022, at 5:47 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > First was the sharp crack, followed by the heavy explosion, which was
> > “rolling right behind” it (in sequence).
> >
> > On Sun, Apr 24, 2022 at 1:55 AM Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com
> >
> > wrote:
> >
> >> V25.27-33, P26.8-14   It was Friday evening, last September, just off
> work,
> >> heading for the Bond Street Underground station, his mind on the weekend
> >> ahead and his two Wrens, that Norma and that Marjorie, whom he must each
> >> keep from learning about the other, just as he was reaching to pick his
> >> nose, suddenly in the sky, miles behind his back and up the river
> >> mementomori a sharp crack and a heavy explosion, rolling right behind,
> >> almost like a clap of thunder. But not quite.
> >>
> >> What does "rolling right behind" modify here?
> >> --
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> >>
> > --
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>
>
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