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Fw: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3482 PAle Fire Canto 4
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----- Original Message -----
From: "pynchon-l-digest" <owner-pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
To: <pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 12, 2003 12:00 AM
Subject: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3482
>
> pynchon-l-digest Tuesday, August 12 2003 Volume 02 : Number
3482
>
>
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 14:57:44 -0700
> From: "s~Z" <keithsz@concentric.net>
> Subject: Re: [NPPF] Canto Four: Versipellis
>
> "We have seen that the original werewolf, howling in the wintry blast, is
a
> kind of psychopomp, or leader of departed souls; he is the wild ancestor
of
> the death-dog, whose voice under the window of a sick-chamber is even now
a
> sound of ill-omen."
>
> --also from "Werewolves and Swan-maidens" by John Fiske
> http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/1871aug/fiskej.htm
>
> - ------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
> - --
>
> "There is always a psychopompos around the corner, isn't there?
>
> --John Shade (p. 226)
>
> ------------------------------
> ------------------------------
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:04:24 -0400
> From: The Great Quail <quail@libyrinth.com>
> Subject: NPPF - Canto 4 - Notes
>
> 839: "speaking of this wonderful machine:" -- Why that metaphor? I
> understand the mock-heroic tone, but why "machine?"
>
> 844: "Is soaping a third time one leg" -- Foreshadowing that Shade muses a
> lot in the bathtub, it seems.
>
> 857-860: Shade here admits that when in the grip of the Muse, he becomes
> absentminded. This may be important later, with the shoe incident.
>
> 874: "midsummer" -- Generally considered a scared/magical time, and
possibly
> ringing with Shakespearean allusions.
>
> 880-881: "this half too/Was fast asleep" -- Shade obviously has very vivid
> dreams of dislocation and possible paralysis. Related to his fits? To
> Hazel's possible mental illness? Or just one of those weird dream-moments?
>
> 884: "a brown shoe lay!" -- Either we accept that some sort of
supernatural
> transference has occurred, or we examine two possibilities: Shade was
> sleepwalking during his "dream," or more likely, had merely left a shoe
> there previously. He has already hinted at his absentmindedness. The
mocking
> tone of his opening may suggest a bit of irony to the lines 884-886, "My
> secret stamp,/The Shade impress, the mystery inborn,/Mirages, miracles,
> midsummer morn."
>
> 887: "Since my biographer may be too staid" -- Some irony for us, knowing
> Kinbote will serve as his most immediate biographer. We later find out
that
> Kinbote has indeed spied on Shade in the bath.
>
> 894: "and like Marat bleed." -- Jean-Paul Marat, 1743-1793. Writer and
> doctor, associated with the French Revolution. He was murdered in his
> bathtub by Charlotte Corday. Also features in Peter Weiss' bizarre play,
> "The persecution and assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as performed
> by the inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the direction of
> the Marquis de Sade."
>
> More on Marat from Wikipedia:
> http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Paul_Marat
>
> 897: "wick" -- "A piece of material that conveys liquid by capillary
> action." (American Heritage Dictionary)
>
> 900: "Newport Frill" -- I am assuming this is a species of Frill lizard,
but
> I cannot find any direct references. Perhaps related to the Blind Albino
> Cave Hoek? Here's some lovely images of Frilled Lizards.
>
> http://home.mira.net/~areadman/liz.htm
>
> 911: "fussy bimanists" -- I cannot find a reference for "bimanist."
Possibly
> a made-up word implying one who needs both hands to shave? ("Bi" = two and
> "mani" = hands?")
>
> 912: "ephebe" -- "A youth between 18 and 20 years of age in ancient
Greece."
> (American Heritage Dictionary) Sounds right up Kinbote's alley!
>
> 922: "Our Cream" -- Ostensibly, a commercial brand of shaving cream that
ran
> TV ads in the 50s. Kinbote later corrects Shade, remarking that "Our
Cream"
> is a "bubbly foam" rather than a cream.
>
> 932: "screaks" -- a real word, means "shriek" or "creak." (As if you
> couldn't guess that!)
>
> 937: "Sunglassers tour Beirut" -- I assume "sunglassers" means tourists.
Any
> ideas?
>
> 938: "Zembla's fields" -- This inelegant mention of Zembla is the poem's
> second and only mention of Zembla. Sorry, Charlie.
>
> 940: "Unfinished poem." -- "Pale Fire" itself, maybe?
>
> 944-945: "Or a shoehorn, which turns into the spoon/I eat my egg with" --
> Please, God, let this not be literal....
>
> 948: "versipel" -- Shade is comparing his muse to a lycanthrope, a
> shapeshifter -- "versipel: a creature that is supposed to change
> from one form to another, as the werewolf." From:
>
> http://members.aol.com/rstark1957/Words.html
>
> Keith seems to find this more evidence of something weird going on. Maybe
> Maud digs wolves?
>
> 951: "above the syllable" -- her name *is* Sybil after all....
>
> 967-962: Regarding Shade's books, this link might be fun:
>
> http://www.invisiblelibrary.com/libauthor4.htm
>
> 967: "Night Rote" -- Kinbote glosses this as "the nocturnal sound of the
> sea." Your mileage may vary.
>
> 968: "Hebe's Cup" -- Hebe was the Greek gods' cup-bearer, from which they
> quaffed the ambrosia that made them immortal. She later marries Hercules.
>
> Here's a lovely picture, with some rocking good music:
>
> http://www.mythinglinks.org/autumnequinox2000.html
>
> And more:
>
> http://www.facethemusic.org/fantasy/myth/ggoddess3.html
>
> 962: "Pale Fire" -- Much discussed around here, probably from "Timon of
> Athens." Also used throughout the book....
>
> 965: "brown ament" -- Two interesting definitions: Webster's has " A
species
> of inflorescence; a catkin." American Heritage has "A person with severely
> deficient intellectual capacity." I would assume Shade means the later, as
a
> parody of a "brown study?" Or is "ament" the actual noun he couldn't think
> of earlier?
>
> 967-968: "consonne/D'appui" -- an intrusive consonant, something that
Shade
> clearly does love.
>
> 977-978: "I'm reasonably sure that we survive/And that my darling
somewhere
> is alive" -- Obviously meaning Hazel; a rather powerful admission at the
end
> of the poem.
>
> 979-982: The irony of these lines is sharp, as Shade will be murdered this
> evening.
>
> 993 -- "A dark Vanessa" -- Nabokov's beloved Red Admirable butterfly.
>
> 998: "Some neighbor's gardener, I guess" -- Kinbote's gardener, in fact.
He
> plays an important role in the murder scene.
>
> - --Quail
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:04:33 -0400
> From: The Great Quail <quail@libyrinth.com>
> Subject: NPPF - Canto 4 Summary
>
> Canto Four
>
> Kinbote's Foreword:
>
> As discussed by Kinbote in his Foreword, Canto Four is "short," consisting
> of 166 lines and covering thirteen cards, "of which the last four used on
> the day of his death give a Corrected Draft instead of a Fair Copy." Again
> according to Kinbote, it was begun on July 19, and is "extremely rough in
> appearance, teeming with devastating erasures and cataclysmic insertions."
> Despite this, Kinbote claims that is is "beautifully accurate" under it's
> "confused surface."
>
> Of controversial interest is the ending of the poem itself. Although
Kinbote
> claims that the poem was completed -- sans one possible line, line 1000,
> which would repeat line 1 -- he quotes a few Shadeans who publicly
wondered
> whether or not Shade had truly completed the work. If Kinbote is to be
> trusted, however, he heard from Shade himself that the work was near
> completion.
>
> Summary
> Lines 835-999:
>
> Lines 835-839 open the canto with Shade boasting that he will spy on
beauty
> and do what no one has yet done. This establishes a sort of mock-heroic
> tone, for Shade is about to discuss himself.
>
> From here, Shade spends some time musing on the two different ways that
"the
> poet" composes. The first, method A, is spontaneous thought -- the brain
> running on as the body goes through motions of the day. He finds this to
be
> "agony." Method B is more meticulous, and involves physically writing the
> poem, which gives the poet more time to think through the verses. He also
> remarks that some times the correct word only reveals itself suddenly
after
> a long period of fruitless labor.
>
> Line 873 is of particular interest because it hints at a possibly
> supernatural event. Disclosing that midsummer mornings are his most
creative
> time, Shade describes an anecdote where he felt dislocated one morning:
one
> half of him remaining in bed, and one half walking out to the lawn wearing
> one shoe. When "both" Shades realized they were dreaming, he awoke in
bed --
> but that morning, he discovered a brown shoe on the lawn!
>
> Line 887 offers an insight on Shade's hygiene to a future biographer. It
> seems that Shade likes shaving in the bathtub, but he often makes a mess
out
> of shaving his "dewlap," frequently cutting himself until he bleeds. Shade
> "distrusts" men in commercials who shave cleanly with one "gliding
stroke."
>
> This leads to an extended metaphor wherein Shade reckons the feeling of
> poetic inspiration to the feeling of being cleanly shaved, particularly as
> seen in TV commercials, where the hair stands on end to be mowed up by an
> "icy blaze."
>
> Line 923 starts of a list of "evil" -- in other words, things Shade does
not
> like: jazz, abstract art, bullfighting, Freud, Marx, frauds, sharks, and
> etc.
>
> Line 932 gets back to shaving -- Shades describes shaving as a series of
> vehicles traveling over his face, switching to an agricultural metaphor
with
> the notable line, "and now I plough Old Zembla's fields where my gray
> stubble grows." Line 939 offers a possible point for all this shaving with
a
> self-directed note in italics: "Man's life as commentary to abstruse
> Unfinished poem."
>
> The next few verses discuss his daily life with Sybil and his "versipel"
> muse. He then reflects on the titles of his previous works, finally
> beseeching Will (Shakespeare) for a title: "Pale Fire." (line 962.) Shade
> enters a pastoral mode as he discusses the close of day, the drifting away
> of poetic inspiration, coming to the revelation that he only understands
> existence through his art. He then states that he is "reasonably sure that
> we survive/And that my darling somewhere is alive."
>
> Ironically, Shade then remarks that he is also "reasonably sure" that he
> will awake the next day, which will "probably be fine." (He will, of
course,
> be murdered that very evening.) He looks out his twilight window and
> reflects on his marriage with Sybil, who is out of sight, probably in the
> garden. A dark Vanessa flutters by as he watches "some neighbor's
gardener"
> trundle an empty barrow up the lane.
>
> The poem ends on line 999 with this vision of Kinbote's gardener; but
> Kinbote insists that for the sake of symmetry, Shade would make line 1000:
> "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain."
>
> - --Q
>
the message body.
From: "pynchon-l-digest" <owner-pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
To: <pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 12, 2003 12:00 AM
Subject: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3482
>
> pynchon-l-digest Tuesday, August 12 2003 Volume 02 : Number
3482
>
>
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 14:57:44 -0700
> From: "s~Z" <keithsz@concentric.net>
> Subject: Re: [NPPF] Canto Four: Versipellis
>
> "We have seen that the original werewolf, howling in the wintry blast, is
a
> kind of psychopomp, or leader of departed souls; he is the wild ancestor
of
> the death-dog, whose voice under the window of a sick-chamber is even now
a
> sound of ill-omen."
>
> --also from "Werewolves and Swan-maidens" by John Fiske
> http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/1871aug/fiskej.htm
>
> - ------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
> - --
>
> "There is always a psychopompos around the corner, isn't there?
>
> --John Shade (p. 226)
>
> ------------------------------
> ------------------------------
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:04:24 -0400
> From: The Great Quail <quail@libyrinth.com>
> Subject: NPPF - Canto 4 - Notes
>
> 839: "speaking of this wonderful machine:" -- Why that metaphor? I
> understand the mock-heroic tone, but why "machine?"
>
> 844: "Is soaping a third time one leg" -- Foreshadowing that Shade muses a
> lot in the bathtub, it seems.
>
> 857-860: Shade here admits that when in the grip of the Muse, he becomes
> absentminded. This may be important later, with the shoe incident.
>
> 874: "midsummer" -- Generally considered a scared/magical time, and
possibly
> ringing with Shakespearean allusions.
>
> 880-881: "this half too/Was fast asleep" -- Shade obviously has very vivid
> dreams of dislocation and possible paralysis. Related to his fits? To
> Hazel's possible mental illness? Or just one of those weird dream-moments?
>
> 884: "a brown shoe lay!" -- Either we accept that some sort of
supernatural
> transference has occurred, or we examine two possibilities: Shade was
> sleepwalking during his "dream," or more likely, had merely left a shoe
> there previously. He has already hinted at his absentmindedness. The
mocking
> tone of his opening may suggest a bit of irony to the lines 884-886, "My
> secret stamp,/The Shade impress, the mystery inborn,/Mirages, miracles,
> midsummer morn."
>
> 887: "Since my biographer may be too staid" -- Some irony for us, knowing
> Kinbote will serve as his most immediate biographer. We later find out
that
> Kinbote has indeed spied on Shade in the bath.
>
> 894: "and like Marat bleed." -- Jean-Paul Marat, 1743-1793. Writer and
> doctor, associated with the French Revolution. He was murdered in his
> bathtub by Charlotte Corday. Also features in Peter Weiss' bizarre play,
> "The persecution and assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as performed
> by the inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the direction of
> the Marquis de Sade."
>
> More on Marat from Wikipedia:
> http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Paul_Marat
>
> 897: "wick" -- "A piece of material that conveys liquid by capillary
> action." (American Heritage Dictionary)
>
> 900: "Newport Frill" -- I am assuming this is a species of Frill lizard,
but
> I cannot find any direct references. Perhaps related to the Blind Albino
> Cave Hoek? Here's some lovely images of Frilled Lizards.
>
> http://home.mira.net/~areadman/liz.htm
>
> 911: "fussy bimanists" -- I cannot find a reference for "bimanist."
Possibly
> a made-up word implying one who needs both hands to shave? ("Bi" = two and
> "mani" = hands?")
>
> 912: "ephebe" -- "A youth between 18 and 20 years of age in ancient
Greece."
> (American Heritage Dictionary) Sounds right up Kinbote's alley!
>
> 922: "Our Cream" -- Ostensibly, a commercial brand of shaving cream that
ran
> TV ads in the 50s. Kinbote later corrects Shade, remarking that "Our
Cream"
> is a "bubbly foam" rather than a cream.
>
> 932: "screaks" -- a real word, means "shriek" or "creak." (As if you
> couldn't guess that!)
>
> 937: "Sunglassers tour Beirut" -- I assume "sunglassers" means tourists.
Any
> ideas?
>
> 938: "Zembla's fields" -- This inelegant mention of Zembla is the poem's
> second and only mention of Zembla. Sorry, Charlie.
>
> 940: "Unfinished poem." -- "Pale Fire" itself, maybe?
>
> 944-945: "Or a shoehorn, which turns into the spoon/I eat my egg with" --
> Please, God, let this not be literal....
>
> 948: "versipel" -- Shade is comparing his muse to a lycanthrope, a
> shapeshifter -- "versipel: a creature that is supposed to change
> from one form to another, as the werewolf." From:
>
> http://members.aol.com/rstark1957/Words.html
>
> Keith seems to find this more evidence of something weird going on. Maybe
> Maud digs wolves?
>
> 951: "above the syllable" -- her name *is* Sybil after all....
>
> 967-962: Regarding Shade's books, this link might be fun:
>
> http://www.invisiblelibrary.com/libauthor4.htm
>
> 967: "Night Rote" -- Kinbote glosses this as "the nocturnal sound of the
> sea." Your mileage may vary.
>
> 968: "Hebe's Cup" -- Hebe was the Greek gods' cup-bearer, from which they
> quaffed the ambrosia that made them immortal. She later marries Hercules.
>
> Here's a lovely picture, with some rocking good music:
>
> http://www.mythinglinks.org/autumnequinox2000.html
>
> And more:
>
> http://www.facethemusic.org/fantasy/myth/ggoddess3.html
>
> 962: "Pale Fire" -- Much discussed around here, probably from "Timon of
> Athens." Also used throughout the book....
>
> 965: "brown ament" -- Two interesting definitions: Webster's has " A
species
> of inflorescence; a catkin." American Heritage has "A person with severely
> deficient intellectual capacity." I would assume Shade means the later, as
a
> parody of a "brown study?" Or is "ament" the actual noun he couldn't think
> of earlier?
>
> 967-968: "consonne/D'appui" -- an intrusive consonant, something that
Shade
> clearly does love.
>
> 977-978: "I'm reasonably sure that we survive/And that my darling
somewhere
> is alive" -- Obviously meaning Hazel; a rather powerful admission at the
end
> of the poem.
>
> 979-982: The irony of these lines is sharp, as Shade will be murdered this
> evening.
>
> 993 -- "A dark Vanessa" -- Nabokov's beloved Red Admirable butterfly.
>
> 998: "Some neighbor's gardener, I guess" -- Kinbote's gardener, in fact.
He
> plays an important role in the murder scene.
>
> - --Quail
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Mon, 11 Aug 2003 18:04:33 -0400
> From: The Great Quail <quail@libyrinth.com>
> Subject: NPPF - Canto 4 Summary
>
> Canto Four
>
> Kinbote's Foreword:
>
> As discussed by Kinbote in his Foreword, Canto Four is "short," consisting
> of 166 lines and covering thirteen cards, "of which the last four used on
> the day of his death give a Corrected Draft instead of a Fair Copy." Again
> according to Kinbote, it was begun on July 19, and is "extremely rough in
> appearance, teeming with devastating erasures and cataclysmic insertions."
> Despite this, Kinbote claims that is is "beautifully accurate" under it's
> "confused surface."
>
> Of controversial interest is the ending of the poem itself. Although
Kinbote
> claims that the poem was completed -- sans one possible line, line 1000,
> which would repeat line 1 -- he quotes a few Shadeans who publicly
wondered
> whether or not Shade had truly completed the work. If Kinbote is to be
> trusted, however, he heard from Shade himself that the work was near
> completion.
>
> Summary
> Lines 835-999:
>
> Lines 835-839 open the canto with Shade boasting that he will spy on
beauty
> and do what no one has yet done. This establishes a sort of mock-heroic
> tone, for Shade is about to discuss himself.
>
> From here, Shade spends some time musing on the two different ways that
"the
> poet" composes. The first, method A, is spontaneous thought -- the brain
> running on as the body goes through motions of the day. He finds this to
be
> "agony." Method B is more meticulous, and involves physically writing the
> poem, which gives the poet more time to think through the verses. He also
> remarks that some times the correct word only reveals itself suddenly
after
> a long period of fruitless labor.
>
> Line 873 is of particular interest because it hints at a possibly
> supernatural event. Disclosing that midsummer mornings are his most
creative
> time, Shade describes an anecdote where he felt dislocated one morning:
one
> half of him remaining in bed, and one half walking out to the lawn wearing
> one shoe. When "both" Shades realized they were dreaming, he awoke in
bed --
> but that morning, he discovered a brown shoe on the lawn!
>
> Line 887 offers an insight on Shade's hygiene to a future biographer. It
> seems that Shade likes shaving in the bathtub, but he often makes a mess
out
> of shaving his "dewlap," frequently cutting himself until he bleeds. Shade
> "distrusts" men in commercials who shave cleanly with one "gliding
stroke."
>
> This leads to an extended metaphor wherein Shade reckons the feeling of
> poetic inspiration to the feeling of being cleanly shaved, particularly as
> seen in TV commercials, where the hair stands on end to be mowed up by an
> "icy blaze."
>
> Line 923 starts of a list of "evil" -- in other words, things Shade does
not
> like: jazz, abstract art, bullfighting, Freud, Marx, frauds, sharks, and
> etc.
>
> Line 932 gets back to shaving -- Shades describes shaving as a series of
> vehicles traveling over his face, switching to an agricultural metaphor
with
> the notable line, "and now I plough Old Zembla's fields where my gray
> stubble grows." Line 939 offers a possible point for all this shaving with
a
> self-directed note in italics: "Man's life as commentary to abstruse
> Unfinished poem."
>
> The next few verses discuss his daily life with Sybil and his "versipel"
> muse. He then reflects on the titles of his previous works, finally
> beseeching Will (Shakespeare) for a title: "Pale Fire." (line 962.) Shade
> enters a pastoral mode as he discusses the close of day, the drifting away
> of poetic inspiration, coming to the revelation that he only understands
> existence through his art. He then states that he is "reasonably sure that
> we survive/And that my darling somewhere is alive."
>
> Ironically, Shade then remarks that he is also "reasonably sure" that he
> will awake the next day, which will "probably be fine." (He will, of
course,
> be murdered that very evening.) He looks out his twilight window and
> reflects on his marriage with Sybil, who is out of sight, probably in the
> garden. A dark Vanessa flutters by as he watches "some neighbor's
gardener"
> trundle an empty barrow up the lane.
>
> The poem ends on line 999 with this vision of Kinbote's gardener; but
> Kinbote insists that for the sake of symmetry, Shade would make line 1000:
> "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain."
>
> - --Q
>
the message body.