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[Fwd: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3622] PALE FIRE
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From: - Sun Oct 26 15:07:40 2003
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pynchon-l-digest Sunday, October 26 2003 Volume 02 : Number 3622
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Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 20:12:17 +1000
From: jbor
Subject: Re: NPPF: Commentary 5 (notes) Lines 433-434
on 25/10/03 8:20 AM, Jasper Fidget wrote:
> Phrynia and Timandra, Mistresses to Alcibiades. Timon calls them harlots,
> whores, and sluts, and they agree that they'll "do anything for gold"
> (IV:iii). I think the reference is both sexual and scholarly for Kinbote,
> as he's mixed (or confused) the two elsewhere. I doubt they stand in for
> two real women in Charles' life though.
I agree. In the dream Phrynia is "prickly-chinned" and Timandra has a "boom
under her apron", somewhat pointedly (sorry) confirming their transvestism.
It's as though they're male actors playing female roles, as per the
conventions of Elizabethan and Jacobean theatre.
But there's something quite exaggerated in Kinbote's elaborate protestations
of his "dream-love" for Disa. It's almost as if he's trying to compete with
Shade's mawkish tribute to Sybil (lines 247-292). It reminds me a little of
that battle of hyperboles enacted between Hamlet and Laertes beside and in
Ophelia's grave.
best
ps. Apologies to Jasper for requoting the Housman poem. I hadn't yet looked
at his supplementary notes to bekah's excellent summaries and comments.
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Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 09:03:10 -0400
From: "Scott Badger"
Subject: RE: NPPF: Commentary 2(summary and notes) Lines 403-404
Jasper:
> Red Admirable makes a cameo as it gradually catches up to the final
> crescendo; the phrase "volant en arrière" means flying behind, but it will
> eventually find Shade: the unusual word "gule" is found in _Timon
> of Athens_
> IV:3: "With man's blood paint the ground, gules, gules."
>
>From Amazon's new word search:
Ulysses:
"Head up! Keep our flag flying (An eagle gules volant in a field argent
displayed. Ulster king at arms! . . ."
Hamlet:
"Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd
With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons,"
The Man Who Was Thursday:
"'Our bearings,' continued Syme calmly, 'are "argent a chevron gules charged
with three cross crosslets of the field"
The Life of Samuel Johnson:
"The arms upon this monument are, paly of eight, gules and or, impaling,
ermine on a chief indented vert"
Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 12:51:34 -0400
From: "Jasper Fidget"
Subject: RE: NPPF: Commentary 5 (notes) Lines 433-434
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-pynchon-l@waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l@waste.org] On
> Behalf Of jbor
>
>
> I agree. In the dream Phrynia is "prickly-chinned" and Timandra has a
> "boom
> under her apron", somewhat pointedly (sorry) confirming their
> transvestism.
> It's as though they're male actors playing female roles, as per the
> conventions of Elizabethan and Jacobean theatre.
D'oh! I actually didn't even realize it, but you're right. Of course in
Zembla Charles' mistresses would be men pretending to be women.
> ps. Apologies to Jasper for requoting the Housman poem. I hadn't yet
> looked
> at his supplementary notes to bekah's excellent summaries and comments.
I don't mind.
Jasper
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 13:11:49 -0400
From: "Jasper Fidget"
Subject: RE: NPPF: Commentary 5 (notes) Lines 433-434
> From: owner-pynchon-l@waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l@waste.org] On
> Behalf Of bekah
>
> Commentary notes to Lines 433-434
> "To the...sea Which we had visited in thirty-three"
>
Just some more stuff in this Commentary:
p. 205
"the Zemblan Revolution broke out (May 1, 1958)"
May Day.
p. 205
"ineffectual attempt to return to Zembla"
The way *back* to Zembla proves impossible.
p. 208
"Harfar Baron of Shalksbore"
King Harald Harfager of Norway, called Fairhair, from Snorri's Heimskringla.
He fought with Hake, son of Gandalf (!), who was one of the kings after the
death of Halfdan the Black. Other kings included Hogne and Frode (heh),
sons of Eystein (yup), king of Hedemark. The settlement of Iceland was a
result of Harald's wars, so another reference to the expansion of
civilization westward ho.
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/heim/index.htm
p. 213
"the /narstran/, a hellish hall where the souls of murderers were tortured
under a constant drizzle of drake venom coming down from the foggy vault"
The word narstran comes from Old Norse "nar" for corpse (as in narwhal) and
the Slavic "stran" for land, so Land of the Dead, probably a variation of
"Nastrond" for "Corpse-Strand" (also Land of the Dead) as found in the
Poetic Edda (Vol. 1, Voluspo):
38. A hall I saw, | far from the sun,
On Nastrond it stands, | and the doors face north,
Venom drops | through the smoke-vent down,
For around the walls | do serpents wind.
39. I saw there wading | through rivers wild
Treacherous men | and murderers too,
And workers of ill | with the wives of men;
There Nithhogg sucked | the blood of the slain,
And the wolf tore men; | would you know yet more?
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/poe/poe03.htm
The reference is also found in the Lokasenna section of the Poetic Edda:
"And after that Loki hid himself in Franang's waterfall in the guise of a
salmon, and there the gods took him. He was bound with the bowels of his son
Vali, but his son Narfi was changed to a wolf. Skathi took a poison-snake
and fastened it up over Loki's face, and the poison dropped thereon. Sigyn,
Loki's wife, sat there and held a shell under the poison, but when the shell
was full she bore away the poison, and meanwhile the poison dropped on Loki.
Then he struggled so hard that the whole earth shook therewith; and now that
is called an earthquake."
http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/poe/poe10.htm
Jasper Fidget
-
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Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2003 04:13:39 +1000
From: jbor
Subject: Re: NPPF "You are telling me!"
> on 25/10/03 1:42 AM, Glenn Scheper at glenn_scheper@earthlink.net wrote:
>
>> Count +one arcane AF fellow in Alfred Edward Housman.
>
> From what I know neither Housman, nor any other of the major poets you've
> continually tried to lumber with the mantle, was blessed with a
> double-jointed vertebra. I think this constant barrage of AF propaganda does
> an enormous disservice to the life and work of these authors and poets.
Just to clarify this. I don't agree that any of the poets or writers
mentioned practised auto-eroticism, or wrote about auto-eroticism, or
thought about it when they wrote, or perceived it as a component of their
aesthetic. And I don't agree that it's present as a reference in any of
their works.
I meant no offence or ill will towards Glenn, and I'm happy to see that he
has four new recruits to his AF fan club.
best
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Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 14:31:54 -0500
From: "Tim Strzechowski"
Subject: Re: NPPF "You are telling me!"
I don't consider myself a member of any "fan clubs" (although, in my younger
and more vulnerable years I sent away for Freakies cereal figurines).
http://www.freakies.com/
Glenn offers a "reading" of the text, much as anyone else in this forum
does. Glenn supports this reading with textual evidence, much as many
others (including you and I) do in this forum. That you aren't *convinced*
of his "reading" is rather arrogant and presumptuous, no? Geez, man, I'm
not entirely convinced that VL is "about" WORK, but that doesn't negate the
efforts of Terrance to explore that theme as one of many possible themes.
Your efforts to backpedal and claim "no offense or ill will toward Glenn"
are nice, but considering that your original comment stated:
[...] "I think this constant barrage of AF propaganda does an enormous
disservice to the life and work of these authors and poets."
http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0310&msg=86763&sort=date
there's enough loaded language in that single statement, obvious to anyone
here, to demonstate otherwise.
While you may not necessarily owe Glenn an apology, at *least* be a man and
admit the connotations of your statement for what they are.
best
> Just to clarify this. I don't agree that any of the poets or writers
> mentioned practised auto-eroticism, or wrote about auto-eroticism, or
> thought about it when they wrote, or perceived it as a component of their
> aesthetic. And I don't agree that it's present as a reference in any of
> their works.
>
> I meant no offence or ill will towards Glenn, and I'm happy to see that he
> has four new recruits to his AF fan club.
>
> best
>
>
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Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 13:16:39 +0000
From: Barbara100
Subject: Re: NP "You are telling me!"
Cut Jbor a break, huh, Doug? You hear what his Australian Parliament did
the other day to our President? (This is beautiful. It warms my heart to
tell you, even if you already know:) They heckled him! During a speech.
Ha!
I was so pleased with the news, I circled the paragraph for all my
co-workers to read. Balls those Aussies! I love them!
I'd like to extend my personal thanks to Jbor and his fine
representatives. Kudos to Australia!
B
pynchonoid wrote:
> Considering that the entire Pale Fire discussion is
> off-topic on Pynchon-L, jbor's seems a strange "ad
> hominem" (using that term as loosely re jbor as he
> uses it with others) attack on an important
> participant in same (the off-topic discussion in which
> jbor also participates).
>
> At any rate, Glenn's posts are way more fun and
> interesting than jbor's tired retreads of the
> Left-bashing hatchet-job on Vineland that he has
> offered again and again in this forum over the past
> few years. I suspect jbor's just jealous of the scope
> of reading that Glenn manages to incorporate and of
> the attention that Glenn's posts receive, and I
> wouldn't be the first to note jbor's need to control
> the discussion here. Also in the context of the
> Vineland discussion, it's pretty humorous to hear jbor
> complaining that somebody else is twisting an author's
> words in a way that does a disservice to the author's
> intent, given the way jbor continues an absurd effort
> to make Pynchon a neocon critic of the 60's, by taking
> out of context and revising what P has written in this
> novel.
>
> Please keep up the good work, Glenn; your AF posts
> seem, at minimum, an entertaining object lesson in a
> kind of "magnificent obsession" that seems to motivate
> some of Pynchon's characters, as you pull together
> disparate literary threads in an thought-provoking
> way. My only request would be that you write about
> Pynchon in Pynchon-L, but that's a purely personal
> opinion, expressed in an unmoderated forum,
> understanding that none of us has been elected
> moderator here.
>
> __________________________________
>
Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 18:04:52 -0400
From: The Great Quail
Subject: Re: NPPF "You are telling me!"
Jbor writes,
> I meant no offence or ill will towards Glenn, and I'm happy to see that he
> has four new recruits to his AF fan club.
Five! Leaving out Doug's tediously predictable attack on Rob, I agree with
what Doug says about Glenn -- whatever you might have to say about his
unusual ideas, he's consistent, interesting, and happily obsessed!
So -- how can I join the auto-fellatio club?
- --Quail
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2003 09:14:16 +1000
From: jbor
Subject: Re: NPPF "You are telling me!"
> [...] "I think this constant barrage of AF propaganda does an enormous
> disservice to the life and work of these authors and poets."
I stand by the comment. I don't think the Book of Revelation has anything to
do with AF and I don't think Housman's poem has anything to do with AF and I
don't think _GR_ has anything to do with AF. Claiming they do does the works
and the the authors an enormous disservice in my opinion.
I'm not, however, calling Glenn a "boob" or trying to censor him. Not in the
least.
best
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Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2003 00: