CoL49 - Group Read End of Book

[Mark Kohut]

JT:  "At one point in her walk along the RR tracks, Oedipa discusses the
"excluded middle" where she knows "bad shit happens". How does this relate
to David's premise that the book is about "What is Reality?”?"

Reality is not binary in its choices, its explanations, its mappings.
Logic, where the excluded middle comes from, does not show reality either...
"bad shit happens' where it can not be explained....bad shit cannot
(always) be explained....THIS IS REALITY....

On Sun, Aug 4, 2024 at 2:42 PM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

>
> > At one point in her walk along the RR tracks, Oedipa discusses the
> "excluded middle" where she knows "bad shit happens". How does this relate
> to David's premise that the book is about "What is Reality?”?
> RR tracks-  opposition : The trains on this track can only go north.
> Negation the trains on this track do not only go  north, they go south
> excluded middle : the trains go both ways.  Whatever.
> I would say that all Pynchon writing concerns the question of what is
> real, and sometimes with the question “What is reality?”.  He wants to
> think about those questions and seems to want his readers to do so. In the
> latter question he gives us a picture of of human reality and
> civilizational reality in which there is much deception, theft,
> exploitation, war and lust  operating as key organizing principles of the
> modern world. He seems to point to routes of escape or awakening from that
> deceptiveness and violence also. Picking heroes gets tricky as all humans
> seem subject to the same forces and tend to pick their own favorite routes.
> My own feeling is that most P characters who pursue this question end up
> closer to knowing more about reality in the end, but rarely very comforted
> or comfortable apart from maybe the Chums of Chance.
>    My problem with David’s question is what does he mean by it?  What is
> either Python or  David Morris saying is reality, and is it to do with the
> realities Pynchon turns  into his multilayered stories and CoL49?
>
> > Why does Oedipa consider Pierce's empire and the will as America? Why
> does this make her feel like an alien?
> "...what it was the Tristero were to have inherited; as perhaps Oedipa one
> day might have. What was left to inherit? That America coded in
> Inverarity’s testament, whose was that? T Pynchon
>
> She has seen, felt and absorbed deeply the situation of the alienated, she
> can see that the people called "great Americans" have a dark and self
> serving legacy. She sees that the comfortable middle shrink from the
> dangers of asking the wrong questions. In some sense she has within her
> both ends and the middle of America but after setting up for a pregnancy
> exam she now knows that she is “unfurrowed", is virgin to all the princes
> and yet  is part of the mystery of life woven from the looms and wombs of
> motherhood, that tears have filled and cleansed her eyes to look out for
> the real creative forces in her world.  Grace looked into her as no other
> has, seeing the tears behind the beauty.
>
> > Why does the IA say that he is the one who's time is up?
>
> Opposition proposition: it was not too late ? How long would it take to
> say I fooled you, or I was paid to mislead you. The line is kind of a
> classic mystery trope meaning I’m done for. It’s hard to imagine a better
> way of interpreting it other than he had deceived her on somebody elses
> behalf.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Aug 4, 2024, at 7:09 AM, J K Van Nort via Pynchon-l <
> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
> >
> > We've come to the last section of the book and the group read. Thanks to
> everyone who participated.
> >
> > Summary:
> > Oedipa wonders if she is pregnant but after making an appointment to get
> tested as Grace Bortz, she skips the appointment. Ghengis Cohen brings her
> materials that include an article plausibly explaining how the Trystero
> left the European continent and began to set up shop in the U.S. Several
> examples of Trystero subtle stamp alterations are mentioned. Bortz thinks
> that the article is possible, considering the way the USPS had monopolized
> by lower prices the postal business. He tells her to find out its
> legitimacy. She continues to have toothaches and strange dreams. Cohen
> calls to say that Pierce's stamp collection will be auctioned off, and the
> Trystero stamps will be part of Lot 49. he says a mystery book bidder had
> signed up for the auction and asked to see Lot 49. They were denied because
> they refused to identify themselves. Cohen believes that this is Trystero,
> attempting to reclaim the stamps. Oedipa gets drunk on bourbon and drives
> through the night without headlights. She fin
> > ally comes to a stop, and uses a payphone to call the Greek Way, asking
> for the IA. He finally comes to the phone but leaves her with a cryptic
> "it's too late". While walking along a RR track, Oed considers that Pierce
> has actually died, that his efforts to use the will to extend his life or
> harass her have failed, and he is gone. She goes over the whole period
> since she first began to unravel Pierce's will and legacy. She compares it
> to America and thinks that if that is America, that she will feel like an
> alien. The next day she calls the firm that is representing the mystery
> bidder who informs her that the buyer will now be attending the auction.
> She meets Cohen there, who wants to try to buy some Mozambique triangles.
> He notes that a premier auctioneer will be crying the lots. He explains
> that crying of lots is how auctioneers describe the process of auctioning.
> She goes into the auction room, wondering how she'll respond if she sees
> the Trystero representative, hears the doors
> > locked and watches as the auctioneer prepares to cry the auction.
> >
> > Questions
> > At one point in her walk along the RR tracks, Oedipa discusses the
> "excluded middle" where she knows "bad shit happens". How does this relate
> to David's premise that the book is about "What is Reality?"?
> >
> > Why does Oedipa consider Pierce's empire and the will as America? Why
> does this make her feel like an alien?
> >
> > What has been revealed by Oedipa's efforts?
> >
> > Why does the IA say that he is the one who's time is up?
> >
> > In solidarity,
> > James
> >
> > Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >
>
>
>
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