GR translation: be he always in flower

[Mike Jing]

Yes, that's it. Thanks, Robert.


On Sat, Aug 16, 2025 at 8:21 PM Robert Mahnke <rpmahnke at gmail.com> wrote:

> Not 100% sure of it, but I think “be he in flower” means “may he be in
> flower”, an expressed wish for the thing to be so.
>
>
> > On Aug 16, 2025, at 12:39 PM, Mike Jing <gravitys.rainbow.cn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > V580.3-13, P590.1-11   “You have the two choices,” Jamf cried, his last
> > lecture of the year: outside were the flowery strokings of wind, girls in
> > pale-colored dresses, oceans of beer, male choruses intensely, movingly
> > lifted as they sang Semper sit in flores/ Semper sit in flo-ho-res . . .
> > “stay behind with carbon and hydrogen, take your lunch-bucket in to the
> > works every morning with the faceless droves who can’t wait to get in out
> > of the sunlight—or move beyond. Silicon, boron, phosphorus—these can
> > replace carbon, and can bond to nitrogen instead of hydrogen—” a few
> > snickers here, not unanticipated by the playful old pedagogue, be he
> always
> > in flower: his involvement in getting Weimar to subsidize the IG’s
> > Stickstoff Syndikat was well known—
> >
> > What does the inversion of subject and verb in "be he always in flower"
> > indicate here?
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>
>