CoL49 group reading ch 3: 33, 34 - drip-dry is right

[Joseph Tracy]

This is from my notes on the chapter and proposes that the Czar mistake was Fallopian’s.

 ! Nicholas 2 !( inaccurate history Nick 2 didn’t become czar until 1896*)sends Russian flee to SF Bay Area  to “keep Britain and France from (among other things) intervening on the side of the Confederacy.    What were the other things and are they relevant to story? 4 corvettes 2 clippers under rear ad. Popov (probably fictional)

Did TRP get this wrong himself or is he putting wildly inaccurate history in the mouth of Fallopian and the Pinguid society , oddly combined with a real but  nitpicky and meaningless possible incident ( Confederate vs Russian ships) of recorded history, and showing that neither the Birch-like PP society nor the educated anti communist corporate lawyer Metzger,  nor the Cornell educated stickler for accuracy, Oedipa, know enough about Russian history to catch this glaring mistake? How many Americans would? Alexander II made the declaration to free the Serfs and was emperor during US civil war and my sense is that Pynchon did know this!  

 Fallopian’s point in the story is to make a claim about US Russian hostility and the history mistake makes it sound like he might prefer continued serfdom along with heroizing  the confederacy.“Peter Pinguid was really our first casualty. Not the fanatic our more left-leaning friends over in the Birch Society chose to martyrize.”

John Birch , Baptist Missionary turned Army Air Force intelligence officer turned OSS officer was killed by Chinese Communists in an area they controlled on a mission to convince them to wait for a turnover of authority by Japan to the Kuomintang. He was allowed past several communist checkpoints but was shot when he entered  his destination area and refused to surrender his sidearm. There is a similarity here to his usefulness to the far right despite the questionable nature of his martyrdom, to advance inaccurate JBS history( Illuminati conspiracy theories, Ike as secret communist etc.)

> On May 19, 2024, at 4:49 PM, Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Dang! I thought I'd discovered an exciting discrepancy for us to parse.
> 
> On Sun, May 19, 2024, 3:32 PM Michael Bailey <michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> No, you’re totally right -
>> Tried to buy the e-book so I could copy & paste
>> 
>> but there was a fail of some kind
>> 
>> so I was using the paperback & in the short time between looking at the
>> page & typing at my phone there was slippage.
>> 
>> The text says “drip-dry” not Sta-Prest
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Sun, May 19, 2024 at 12:44 PM Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> Then Mike Fallopian, a “frail young man in a Sta-Prest suit” ...
>>> 
>>> I'm reading an old, tattered Bantam paperback version (13th printing,
>>> November 1976), and on p. 31, the text is: "a frail young man in a drip-dry
>>> suit" ... When was the change made? Drip dry (no need to put in the dryer,
>>> is a different concept than Sta-Prest (no need to iron).
>>> 
>>> Also, the cross-edition error of confusing Czar Alexander II (who freed
>>> the serfs in 1861) with Czar Nicholas II, who's best known for being
>>> murdered by the Bolsheviks. A deliberate error on Fallopian's part? Or
>>> Pynchon's?
>>> 
>>> On another note, I noticed for the first time (unobservant!) a citation:
>>> 
>>> A portion of this novel was first published in ESQUIRE magazine under the
>>> title "The World (This One), the Flesh (Mrs. Oedpia Maas) and the Testament
>>> of Pierce Inverarity." Another portion has appeared in CAVALIER.
>>> 
>>> Cavalier was a Playboy-like publication with fiction and nudies.
>>> Apparently the excerpt was called "The Shrink Flips." Anyone read either
>>> excerpt?
>>> 
>>> Laura
>>> 
>>> On Sun, May 19, 2024 at 4:23 AM Michael Bailey <
>>> michael.lee.bailey at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> “Report all obscene mail to your potsmaster”
>>>> This postmark raises questions.
>>>> 
>>>> As she thinks later (I seem to recall) Pierce was rich enough to
>>>> commission
>>>> all kinds of fuckery.
>>>> 
>>>> So if Wendell put the letter in their mailbox for the US post to pick up
>>>> -
>>>> a Pierce myrmidon could easily have intercepted it.
>>>> 
>>>> Or it could just be a misprint.
>>>> 
>>>> Metzger interprets it literally - and I think the idea of a potsmaster is
>>>> somewhat pleasing, with which I think she shows concurrence by tossing a
>>>> brassiere at him instead of something harder.
>>>> 
>>>> - the question of Pierce hovers over the whole story - did he set all
>>>> this
>>>> stuff up? If so, why? Is it having the desired effect, or are her mental
>>>> gyrations different than what he might have wanted?
>>>> 
>>>> Why did she cry when Metzger told her Pierce said she wouldn’t be easy?
>>>> 
>>>> Who is this Metzger anyway? He says he wasn’t close to PI, just drew up
>>>> the
>>>> will. But if Pierce was confiding about Oedipa’s “easiness” (which is
>>>> tough
>>>> to construe as anything other than sexual) then he must’ve expected their
>>>> tryst; indeed, he may have directed it. Purchased it, to put it baldly.
>>>> Although it’s also tough to imagine Metzger raising objections or his
>>>> price, isn’t it?
>>>> 
>>>> Why is she staying at a cheap motel? She didn’t check in with Pierce’s
>>>> people and no credit card was mentioned as coming with the notification,
>>>> was it? So she would’ve at least checked in with her own money - but
>>>> since
>>>> Metzger was motivated (& presumably paid) enough to track her down,
>>>> Pierce’s funds would probably come into play. What’s an executrix role
>>>> without a few perks?
>>>> 
>>>> That such a room would have a walk-in closet would seem unlikely, but the
>>>> gyrations with the dresser prove that description was exaggerated.
>>>> 
>>>> Their restlessness when the room “became impossible” leads them out of
>>>> the
>>>> Paranoids’ purview in search of strong drink, to a bar called “The
>>>> Scope.”
>>>> 
>>>> The nose-picking nerds in The Scope resent them when they walk in, but
>>>> the
>>>> bartender explains the electronic music setup.
>>>> 
>>>> Metzger asks questions as if unfamiliar, but if he’s doing all this at
>>>> Pierce’s behest, he’s actually brought her there on purpose, and would
>>>> know
>>>> already.
>>>> - unless Pierce just told him to bring her there & he’d never been before
>>>> 
>>>> Then Mike Fallopian, a “frail young man in a Sta-Prest suit” invites
>>>> himself to join their party, with a pitch for the Peter Pinguid Society.
>>>> --
>>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>>>> 
>>> 
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l