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[Michael Bailey]

*Mike Jing wrote - *

*and such rates of change as how quickly one’s
*>* relevant masses can be moved to a given frontier . . .
*>>* Is this what the word "masses" mean here:
*>>* *b.* *Military*. A close formation of troops, *esp.* one in which the
*>* battalions, etc., are arranged one behind another.
*>* --*


*David Morris wrote:*


*Of course you have found one meaning that was surely intended, but
remember the word “relevant” is the modifier. When one looks at a work of
art, a painting, the connoisseur advises one to step backwards, just like
this, until the details blurr a bit. You are even told to squint your eyes,
so that you intentionally lose focus, in order to “see” an abstracted
version. A Gestalt understanding of what you are looking at. “Gestalt
psychology, gestaltism or configurationism is a school of psychology that
emerged in the early twentieth century in Austria and Germany as a theory
of perception that was a rejection of basic principles of Wilhelm Wundt's
and Edward Titchener's elementalist and structuralist psychology.” Gestalt
psychologists emphasized that organisms perceive entire patterns or
configurations, not merely individual components. The view is sometimes
summarized using the adage, "the whole is more than the sum of its parts." *


*- I agree with David that Werfner’s advice on holistic viewing here
is applicable beyond the immediate scene in the room with the maps.*

*In fact it could be good advice for literary appreciation in general.*

*On a less lofty level, such a viewpoint is very helpful in doing word
search puzzles (for those who occasionally indulge in them) faster
than systematic up and down and across.*

*In this passage, the advice suggests - beyond an approach to
Werfner’s wall full of maps - ways for Lew to approach the Cohen’s
“atonement” which Lew is still pondering.*

*He’s already in the past page or two considered his own guilt in
anti-union activities as a private dick* (although he seemingly hasn’t
yet brought thoughts about his primal Chicago guilt into the mix), and
goes forward from this passage into a kind of “holistic” view of
Werfner’s instructions which include wider effects of tracking the
Gentleman bomber (to which Werfner segued from ruminating
uninformatively about the Interdict)*

*[also mentioned in GR?]*

*and the possibility that Werfner is mad. So Lew has achieved some
measure of that less immediate view.*


*I do want to add that “relevant masses” could quite likely refer to
troop movements - maybe even primarily - but would also connote the
movements of consumer goods, war matériel, maybe even the planetary
vibrations caused by the passage of heavily laden trains, or the
Masses to be said by priests traveling on such trains - if Werfner is
hyper-holistic to that degree… *


** also he’s playing with the Iceland Spar concept of two selves - one
the Pinkerton goon, the other a deerstalker-hat wearing echt-detective
 - almost certainly as an aftereffect of the Cohen’s gentle mental
nudging.*

*Werfner’s holistic thinking on top of the Cohen’s advice lets Lew
consider both roles - catch the guy people say is bad, but also learn
from him. And include some healthy skepticism.*