AtD translation: Best Boy at Colney Hatch

[Mike Weaver]

Best Boy organises electrical matters - main electrical association with 
insane asylums = administration of ECT (electro-convulsive treatment).


On 10/05/2026 18:33, Mike Jing wrote:

> P238.35-239.10   “It’s too good to pass up,” he groaned aloud to Grand
> Cohen Nookshaft, his spiritual adviser. “Isn’t it?”
>         “I’m thinking,” said the Cohen, whose money had been in
> three-percent consols for longer than he could remember, or remember why,
> “I’m thinking.”
>         “I’ve never understood,” said Clive Crouchmas, “why, with all the
> precognitive talent around this place, no one has ever . . .” He paused, as
> if seeking a diplomatic way to go on.
>         “Some serious dissonance between psychical gifts and modern
> capitalism, I’d imagine,” said the Cohen, somewhat shortly. “Mutually
> antagonistic, you’d have to say. We also do try not to become too mental,
> like some in your own shop, over this railway Concession.”
>         “Were I not out here walking free amongst you all,” declared Clive
> Crouchmas, “I should be Best Boy at Colney Hatch. The other night, for just
> half a second, I saw . . . I thought I saw . . .”
>         “It’s all right, Crouchmas, one hears this sort of thing all the
> time.”
>
> What does "Best Boy" mean here?
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l