Thomas Pynchon Wiki - User contributions [en]

Chapter 3

2008-10-14T18:22:04Z

Tomwhite56:

{{CL49 PbP Text}}

a: 47, b: 34 - '''Yoyodyne''' 
The company also appears in ''V.'', where the power (dynamis in Greek, cf. dynamo, dynamite, dynasty) and physics of the yo-yo's motion is meditated upon. Yoyodyne is said to be 'modeled"--given Pynchon's sea-changing mind--on the Boeing Company where Pynchon worked in the early sixties.

[[Image:oscilloscope.gif|thumb|right|200px|Lissajous figures on an oscilloscope, with 90 degrees phase difference between x and y inputs.]]
a: 47, b: 34 - '''oscilloscope... Lissajous figures''' 
An oscilloscope is a piece of electronic test equipment that allows signal voltages to be viewed, usually as a two-dimensional graph. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscilloscope Wikipedia] Lissajous curves (Lissajous figures or Bowditch curves) are the graph of the system of parametric equations which describes complex harmonic motion, and are displayed on oscilloscope monitors. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lissajous_curve Wikipedia]

a: 47, b: 34 - '''Stockhausen''' 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karlheinz_Stockhausen '''Karlheinz Stockhausen'''] (b. 1928, d. 2007) was a German composer, and one of the most important and controversial composers of the 20th century. He is best known for his ground-breaking work in electronic music and controlled chance in serial composition. The Beatles, among other rock musicians, claimed him as an [http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5j2OLVL0rWGZE0bskTr5kVlUqJLag '''influence''']:

:. . . .So taken were the Beatles by Stockhausen's music, they asked permission to use his photo on the cover of the 1967 LP Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. He appears fifth from the left in the back row.

Stockhausen's [http://ccrma.stanford.edu/CCRMA/Courses/154/Hymnen '''Hymnen'''], composed in 1966/1967 is an obvious primary inspriation for John Lennon's experiment in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musique_concrète '''Musique Concrète'''], [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_9 '''Revolution # 9'''].

a: 48, b: 34 - '''Mike Fallopian''' 
Obviously, Fallopian tubes are two very fine tubes leading from the ovaries of female mammals into the uterus. 
The ''-ian'' ending of his name indicates that Mike is a member of California's vigorous Armenian-American community which is a satirization of the John Birch Society.

a: 49, b: 35 - '''Disgruntled''' 
Pynchon's fictional navy includes the USS Scaffold and the Susanna Squaducci (V.), the John E. Badass (GR), and the Inconvenience (ATD).

a: 49, b: 35 - '''Bogatir... Gaidamak''' 
The bogatyr was a medieval Russian heroic warrior, comparable to the Western European knight errant. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogatyr Wikipedia] The parallel with Charlemagne's "paladins" may be even closer.

At the time of the U.S. Civil War, gaidamak or haydamak denoted an 18th century Ukrainian fighter for national independence. The name is sometimes translated as "Ukrainian Cossack," perhaps in part because it was extended to Cossack anti-Bolshevik troops after the 1917 revolution.

a: 50, b: 36 - '''Birch Society''' 
The John Birch Society is an Americanist organization founded in 1958 to fight what it saw as growing threats to the Constitution of the United States, especially a suspected communist infiltration of the United States government, and to support free enterprise. It was named after John Birch, a United States military intelligence officer and Baptist missionary in World War II who was killed in 1945 by armed supporters of the Communist Party of China, and whom the JBS describes as "the first American victim of the Cold War." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society Wikipedia]

"Our left-leaning friends in the Birch society" is a joke as the Birch Society was right-wing, although of course Fallopian is being serious. The PPS is beyond far right in this sense.

a: 51, b: 37 - '''Marxism... Industrial ''anything''''' 
Some critics have interpreted this to mean that the Pinguid Society is so anti-communist that it even opposed capitalism... because it led inevitably to communism! While funny, this seems to miss the point. The guiding philosophy of the Pinguid Society is not anti-communism. It opposes "industrial ''anything''", which indicates a belief in another philosophy Pynchon has written much on, Ludditisim. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite Wikipedia entry on Luddite]; the 1984 essay, [http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_essays_luddite.html Is it OK to be a Luddite?] by Pynchon; and [http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/paper_gibbs.html Portrait of the Artist as a Young Luddite], an essay on ''Minstral Island'', the aborted sci-fi musical written by Pynchon and future leading Luddite, Kirkpatrick Sale.

a: 52, b: 38 - '''Get in touch with Kirby through WASTE only. . . .''' 
First apperance of the '''W.A.S.T.E. Postal system.

see [[Understanding_W.A.S.T.E.|'''Understanding W.A.S.T.E.''']] 

a: 52, b: 38 - '''Muted Posthorn/Sigil''' 
The visual design of the [http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/4/45/MutedPosthorn.png '''Symbol'''] of the W.A.S.T.E. postal system appears to be an improvised [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigil_(magic) '''Magical Sigil''']. Note that a number of these sigils can be found in A. E. Waite's [http://tinyurl.com/3cakdj '''Book of Black Magic'''], a work referenced in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Pages_733-735 '''Geli Tripping's love spell'''] in the author's next work, [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page '''''Gravity's Rainbow''''']. The [http://www.geocities.com/xeroiii/Goetia/Amd.gif '''Seal of Amduscias'''] [found on page 218 of Weiser's 1972 reprint] appears to be the likely inspiration. Miles Davis is another probable inspiration. See a: 63, b: 48 - '''The Courier's Tragedy''', below.

a: 53, b: 39 - '''Washington and Dallas chapters''' 
For readers in 1966, singling out Washington and Dallas might bring to mind the recent assassination of President Kennedy.

:Charles Hollander sees CoL49 as a big coded commentary on the assassination. [http://www.vheissu.info/art/art_eng_49_hollander.htm '''''Pynchon, JFK and the CIA: Magic Eye Views of The Crying of Lot 49''''']

a: 56 b: 41 - '''ogived''' 
From WIktionary: (architecture) A Gothic pointed arch, or a rib of a Gothic vault

a: 56, b: 41 - '''reconstruction of some European pleasure-casino''' 
Perhaps the Casino Hermann Goering from ''Gravity's Rainbow''?

a: 57, b: 42 - '''trimaran''' 
A multihull boat consisting of a main hull and two smaller outrigger hulls, attached to the main hull with lateral struts.

a: 57, b: 42 - '''Godzilla II''' 
There seems to be some kind of joke from somewhere that Pynchon was rumored to be writing a novel about Godzilla and Mothra at some point... More???
In a letter to his editor in the sixties, Cork Smith, as he was writing ''Gravity's Rainbow'', he spoke of also working on two other books. One was about the two
men who created the Mason/Dixon line, an easy one for us, the other was said
to be inspired by Pynchon's love of the Godzilla movies and was about a monster which came from under the ice. [Spoiler for another work]: That, if not a put-on, which TRP did not seem to do with Cork Smith, seems to be a small but real part of what became ''Against the Day''. 
In this context it is important to remember the origins of the Godzilla story.

a: 58, b: 43 - '''sfacim''' 
Italian slang, literally "semen" but also used as an insult roughly equivalent to "son of a bitch."

a: 58, b: 43 - '''Darrowlike''' 
Clarence Seward Darrow (1857 - 1938) was a famous American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, best known for defending teenaged thrill killers and defending John T. Scopes in the so-called "Monkey" Trial. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Darrow Wikipedia]

:Hollander [http://www.vheissu.info/art/art_eng_49_hollander.htm#chap_3 interprets] the mention of Darrow as proof of his theory that the Russian naval encounter described by Fallopian is a reference to the purchase of Alaska from Russia, "Seward's folly."

[[Image:jaguarxke.jpg|thumb|150px|right|a 1965 Jaguar XKE]]
a: 59, b: 43 - '''XKE''' 
The Jaguar XKE was a famous sportscar, later selected by the Museum of Modern Art in New York as the 'world's most beautiful automobile.' Some connection with mafioso Tony Jaguar?

a: 61, b: 46 - '''Lago di Pietà''' 
An actual historical event?

a: 63, b: 48 - '''The Courier's Tragedy''' 
An anonymous black-clad femme is the first to mention the play, though she does so without actually naming it:

:"You know, blokes," remarked one of the girls, a long-waisted, brown-haired lovely in a black knit leotard and pointed sneakers, "this all has a most bizarre resemblance to that ill, ill Jacobean revenge play we went to last week." 
See [[Bonjour_Tristesse!!!|'''Bonjour Tristesse!!!''']] & [[Making sense of The Courier's Tragedy]]

a: 65, b: 49 - '''civil war''' 
The English Civil War consisted of a series of armed conflicts and political machinations that took place between Parliamentarians (known as Roundheads) and Royalists (known as Cavaliers) between 1642 and 1651. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Civil_War Wikipedia]

a: 66, b: 50 - '''Maenad roar of nitre's song''' 
In Greek mythology, Maenads were female worshippers of Dionysus, the Greek god of mystery, wine and intoxication, and the Roman god Bacchus. The word literally translates as "raving ones". They were known as wild, insane women who could not be reasoned with. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maenads Wikipedia] In Euripides' Bacchae, some of the women are voluntary worshippers of the god, strike the earth for milk, wine, and honey, hunt and tear apart wild animals, eating the flesh raw (sparagmos); the women of Thebes are driven mad as a punishment, however, for not giving the god (from Thebes itself originally, his mother being a Theban princess) full respect. The boy-king Pentheus' own mother tears him apart in a grotesque distortion of the "real" maenads' practice of "sparagmos". Dionysus himself is torn apart (and reborn) in some versions of the story.

Niter or nitre is the mineral form of potassium nitrate, KNO3, also known as saltpeter, an essential ingredient of gunpowder.

a: 66, b: 50 - '''cantus firmus''' 
In music, a cantus firmus ("fixed song") is a pre-existing melody forming the basis of a polyphonic composition, often set apart by being played in long notes. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantus_firmus Wikipedia]

a: 66, b: 50 - '''Thurn und Taxis''' 
The Princely House of Thurn and Taxis (German: Das Fürstenhaus Thurn und Taxis) is a German family that was a key player in the postal (mail) services in Europe in the 16th century and is well known as owners of breweries and builders of countless castles. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurn_and_Taxis Wikipedia] Also noteworthy is Rainer Maria Rilke's dedication of [http://homestar.org/bryannan/duino.html '''Duineser Elegien'''] to Princess Maria von Thurn in whose castle Rilke wrote the elegies. Excerpts from the elegies appear in ''GR''.

a: 67, b: 51 - '''aqua regia''' 
Aqua regia (Latin for "royal water") is a highly corrosive mixture of nitric acid and hydrochloric acid. It is one of the few reagents that dissolves gold and platinum. It was so named because it can dissolve the so-called royal, or noble metals. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqua_regia Wikipedia]

a: 73, b: 57 - '''blank verse''' 
Blank verse is a type of poetry, distinguished by having a regular meter, but no rhyme. In English, the meter most commonly used with blank verse has been iambic pentameter. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blank_verse Wikipedia]

a: 75, b: 59 - '''picket the V.A.''' 
Veteran's Administration, probably.

a: 76, b: 59 - '''Young Republican''' 
Young Republicans is the name of an organization for members of the Republican Party of the United States between the ages of 18 and 40. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Republicans Wikipedia]

a: 76, b: 59 - '''Hap Harrigan comics''' 
Hap Harrigan was a character in the 1931 film, [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021973/ The Hot Heiress] (IMDB), but Weisenburger and Grant believe that Pynchon may have meant Hop Harrigan, a comic strip and radio character from the 1940s.

a: 79, b: 62 - '''I'm the projector of the planetarium''' 
This reference to creation recalls the Remedios Varo painting in Chapter 1, in which the girls in the tower weave the world. Cf. "Shall I project a world?" from this novel.

{{CL49 PbP}}

Chapter 3

2008-10-14T17:02:02Z

Tomwhite56:

{{CL49 PbP Text}}

a: 47, b: 34 - '''Yoyodyne''' 
The company also appears in ''V.'', where the power (dynamis in Greek, cf. dynamo, dynamite, dynasty) and physics of the yo-yo's motion is meditated upon. Yoyodyne is said to be 'modeled"--given Pynchon's sea-changing mind--on the Boeing Company where Pynchon worked in the early sixties.

[[Image:oscilloscope.gif|thumb|right|200px|Lissajous figures on an oscilloscope, with 90 degrees phase difference between x and y inputs.]]
a: 47, b: 34 - '''oscilloscope... Lissajous figures''' 
An oscilloscope is a piece of electronic test equipment that allows signal voltages to be viewed, usually as a two-dimensional graph. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscilloscope Wikipedia] Lissajous curves (Lissajous figures or Bowditch curves) are the graph of the system of parametric equations which describes complex harmonic motion, and are displayed on oscilloscope monitors. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lissajous_curve Wikipedia]

a: 47, b: 34 - '''Stockhausen''' 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karlheinz_Stockhausen '''Karlheinz Stockhausen'''] (b. 1928, d. 2007) was a German composer, and one of the most important and controversial composers of the 20th century. He is best known for his ground-breaking work in electronic music and controlled chance in serial composition. The Beatles, among other rock musicians, claimed him as an [http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5j2OLVL0rWGZE0bskTr5kVlUqJLag '''influence''']:

:. . . .So taken were the Beatles by Stockhausen's music, they asked permission to use his photo on the cover of the 1967 LP Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. He appears fifth from the left in the back row.

Stockhausen's [http://ccrma.stanford.edu/CCRMA/Courses/154/Hymnen '''Hymnen'''], composed in 1966/1967 is an obvious primary inspriation for John Lennon's experiment in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musique_concrète '''Musique Concrète'''], [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_9 '''Revolution # 9'''].

a: 48, b: 34 - '''Mike Fallopian''' 
Obviously, Fallopian tubes are two very fine tubes leading from the ovaries of female mammals into the uterus. 
The ''-ian'' ending of his name indicates that Mike is a member of California's vigorous Armenian-American community which is a satirization of the John Birch Society.

a: 49, b: 35 - '''Disgruntled''' 
Pynchon's fictional navy includes the USS Scaffold and the Susanna Squaducci (V.), the John E. Badass (GR), and the Inconvenience (ATD).

a: 49, b: 35 - '''Bogatir... Gaidamak''' 
The bogatyr was a medieval Russian heroic warrior, comparable to the Western European knight errant. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogatyr Wikipedia] The parallel with Charlemagne's "paladins" may be even closer.

At the time of the U.S. Civil War, gaidamak or haydamak denoted an 18th century Ukrainian fighter for national independence. The name is sometimes translated as "Ukrainian Cossack," perhaps in part because it was extended to Cossack anti-Bolshevik troops after the 1917 revolution.

a: 50, b: 36 - '''Birch Society''' 
The John Birch Society is an Americanist organization founded in 1958 to fight what it saw as growing threats to the Constitution of the United States, especially a suspected communist infiltration of the United States government, and to support free enterprise. It was named after John Birch, a United States military intelligence officer and Baptist missionary in World War II who was killed in 1945 by armed supporters of the Communist Party of China, and whom the JBS describes as "the first American victim of the Cold War." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society Wikipedia]

"Our left-leaning friends in the Birch society" is a joke as the Birch Society was right-wing, although of course Fallopian is being serious. The PPS is beyond far right in this sense.

a: 51, b: 37 - '''Marxism... Industrial ''anything''''' 
Some critics have interpreted this to mean that the Pinguid Society is so anti-communist that it even opposed capitalism... because it led inevitably to communism! While funny, this seems to miss the point. The guiding philosophy of the Pinguid Society is not anti-communism. It opposes "industrial ''anything''", which indicates a belief in another philosophy Pynchon has written much on, Ludditisim. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite Wikipedia entry on Luddite]; the 1984 essay, [http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_essays_luddite.html Is it OK to be a Luddite?] by Pynchon; and [http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/paper_gibbs.html Portrait of the Artist as a Young Luddite], an essay on ''Minstral Island'', the aborted sci-fi musical written by Pynchon and future leading Luddite, Kirkpatrick Sale.

a: 52, b: 38 - '''Get in touch with Kirby through WASTE only. . . .''' 
First apperance of the '''W.A.S.T.E. Postal system.

see [[Understanding_W.A.S.T.E.|'''Understanding W.A.S.T.E.''']] 

a: 52, b: 38 - '''Muted Posthorn/Sigil''' 
The visual design of the [http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/4/45/MutedPosthorn.png '''Symbol'''] of the W.A.S.T.E. postal system appears to be an improvised [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigil_(magic) '''Magical Sigil''']. Note that a number of these sigils can be found in A. E. Waite's [http://tinyurl.com/3cakdj '''Book of Black Magic'''], a work referenced in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Pages_733-735 '''Geli Tripping's love spell'''] in the author's next work, [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page '''''Gravity's Rainbow''''']. The [http://www.geocities.com/xeroiii/Goetia/Amd.gif '''Seal of Amduscias'''] [found on page 218 of Weiser's 1972 reprint] appears to be the likely inspiration. Miles Davis is another probable inspiration. See a: 63, b: 48 - '''The Courier's Tragedy''', below.

a: 53, b: 39 - '''Washington and Dallas chapters''' 
For readers in 1966, singling out Washington and Dallas might bring to mind the recent assassination of President Kennedy.

:Charles Hollander sees CoL49 as a big coded commentary on the assassination. [http://www.vheissu.info/art/art_eng_49_hollander.htm '''''Pynchon, JFK and the CIA: Magic Eye Views of The Crying of Lot 49''''']

a: 56, b: 41 - '''reconstruction of some European pleasure-casino''' 
Perhaps the Casino Hermann Goering from ''Gravity's Rainbow''?

a: 57, b: 42 - '''trimaran''' 
A multihull boat consisting of a main hull and two smaller outrigger hulls, attached to the main hull with lateral struts.

a: 57, b: 42 - '''Godzilla II''' 
There seems to be some kind of joke from somewhere that Pynchon was rumored to be writing a novel about Godzilla and Mothra at some point... More???
In a letter to his editor in the sixties, Cork Smith, as he was writing ''Gravity's Rainbow'', he spoke of also working on two other books. One was about the two
men who created the Mason/Dixon line, an easy one for us, the other was said
to be inspired by Pynchon's love of the Godzilla movies and was about a monster which came from under the ice. [Spoiler for another work]: That, if not a put-on, which TRP did not seem to do with Cork Smith, seems to be a small but real part of what became ''Against the Day''. 
In this context it is important to remember the origins of the Godzilla story.

a: 58, b: 43 - '''sfacim''' 
Italian slang, literally "semen" but also used as an insult roughly equivalent to "son of a bitch."

a: 58, b: 43 - '''Darrowlike''' 
Clarence Seward Darrow (1857 - 1938) was a famous American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union, best known for defending teenaged thrill killers and defending John T. Scopes in the so-called "Monkey" Trial. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarence_Darrow Wikipedia]

:Hollander [http://www.vheissu.info/art/art_eng_49_hollander.htm#chap_3 interprets] the mention of Darrow as proof of his theory that the Russian naval encounter described by Fallopian is a reference to the purchase of Alaska from Russia, "Seward's folly."

[[Image:jaguarxke.jpg|thumb|150px|right|a 1965 Jaguar XKE]]
a: 59, b: 43 - '''XKE''' 
The Jaguar XKE was a famous sportscar, later selected by the Museum of Modern Art in New York as the 'world's most beautiful automobile.' Some connection with mafioso Tony Jaguar?

a: 61, b: 46 - '''Lago di Pietà''' 
An actual historical event?

a: 63, b: 48 - '''The Courier's Tragedy''' 
An anonymous black-clad femme is the first to mention the play, though she does so without actually naming it:

:"You know, blokes," remarked one of the girls, a long-waisted, brown-haired lovely in a black knit leotard and pointed sneakers, "this all has a most bizarre resemblance to that ill, ill Jacobean revenge play we went to last week." 
See [[Bonjour_Tristesse!!!|'''Bonjour Tristesse!!!''']] & [[Making sense of The Courier's Tragedy]]

a: 65, b: 49 - '''civil war''' 
The English Civil War consisted of a series of armed conflicts and political machinations that took place between Parliamentarians (known as Roundheads) and Royalists (known as Cavaliers) between 1642 and 1651. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Civil_War Wikipedia]

a: 66, b: 50 - '''Maenad roar of nitre's song''' 
In Greek mythology, Maenads were female worshippers of Dionysus, the Greek god of mystery, wine and intoxication, and the Roman god Bacchus. The word literally translates as "raving ones". They were known as wild, insane women who could not be reasoned with. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maenads Wikipedia] In Euripides' Bacchae, some of the women are voluntary worshippers of the god, strike the earth for milk, wine, and honey, hunt and tear apart wild animals, eating the flesh raw (sparagmos); the women of Thebes are driven mad as a punishment, however, for not giving the god (from Thebes itself originally, his mother being a Theban princess) full respect. The boy-king Pentheus' own mother tears him apart in a grotesque distortion of the "real" maenads' practice of "sparagmos". Dionysus himself is torn apart (and reborn) in some versions of the story.

Niter or nitre is the mineral form of potassium nitrate, KNO3, also known as saltpeter, an essential ingredient of gunpowder.

a: 66, b: 50 - '''cantus firmus''' 
In music, a cantus firmus ("fixed song") is a pre-existing melody forming the basis of a polyphonic composition, often set apart by being played in long notes. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantus_firmus Wikipedia]

a: 66, b: 50 - '''Thurn und Taxis''' 
The Princely House of Thurn and Taxis (German: Das Fürstenhaus Thurn und Taxis) is a German family that was a key player in the postal (mail) services in Europe in the 16th century and is well known as owners of breweries and builders of countless castles. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurn_and_Taxis Wikipedia] Also noteworthy is Rainer Maria Rilke's dedication of [http://homestar.org/bryannan/duino.html '''Duineser Elegien'''] to Princess Maria von Thurn in whose castle Rilke wrote the elegies. Excerpts from the elegies appear in ''GR''.

a: 67, b: 51 - '''aqua regia''' 
Aqua regia (Latin for "royal water") is a highly corrosive mixture of nitric acid and hydrochloric acid. It is one of the few reagents that dissolves gold and platinum. It was so named because it can dissolve the so-called royal, or noble metals. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aqua_regia Wikipedia]

a: 73, b: 57 - '''blank verse''' 
Blank verse is a type of poetry, distinguished by having a regular meter, but no rhyme. In English, the meter most commonly used with blank verse has been iambic pentameter. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blank_verse Wikipedia]

a: 75, b: 59 - '''picket the V.A.''' 
Veteran's Administration, probably.

a: 76, b: 59 - '''Young Republican''' 
Young Republicans is the name of an organization for members of the Republican Party of the United States between the ages of 18 and 40. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Republicans Wikipedia]

a: 76, b: 59 - '''Hap Harrigan comics''' 
Hap Harrigan was a character in the 1931 film, [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021973/ The Hot Heiress] (IMDB), but Weisenburger and Grant believe that Pynchon may have meant Hop Harrigan, a comic strip and radio character from the 1940s.

a: 79, b: 62 - '''I'm the projector of the planetarium''' 
This reference to creation recalls the Remedios Varo painting in Chapter 1, in which the girls in the tower weave the world. Cf. "Shall I project a world?" from this novel.

{{CL49 PbP}}

Chapter 1

2008-10-14T16:37:23Z

Tomwhite56:

{{CL49 PbP Text}}

Title Page: '''The Crying of Lot 49''' 
In property auctions, numbered "lots" of property or tangible objects are "cried" by an auctioneer. For a discussion of some other things the title may or may not allude to, see the article [[7 x 7|'''''7 x 7''''']].

a: 9, b: 1 - '''Oedipa''' 
Oedipus was the mythical king of Thebes who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oedipus Wikipedia] Oedipus the King, aka Oedipus Rex, is a Greek tragedy written by Sophocles and first performed in 428 BC. Many critics, including Aristotle, consider it the greatest tragedy ever written. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oedipus_the_King Wikipedia]

:Whether Oedipa has anything to do with Oedipus is an open question. Some critics find zero connection and note that the name indicates that names are only words, and not necessarily full of meaning (mysteries without answers being a theme in CoL49). Others have teased various interpretations from Sophocles' play to connect its protagonist to Pynchon's. So far, no single explanation is remotely concrete or thoroughly convincing. [[User:Bleakhaus|Bleakhaus]]

For more discussion of Oedipa's name, see the [[Talk:Chapter_1|Discussion page]].

a: 9, b: 1 - '''Maas''' 

'''Maas''' Translates from Dutch & German into '''Web''' or '''Network''' and is also an alternative spelling for the '''Meuse''' river in Belgium and the Netherlands. Phoenetically, Maas may be interesting if pronounced as Mas, which coupled with Oedipa's husband's first name, would be Mucho Mas, or, translated to English, Much More. 
For more, see [[Maas_y_Mas| '''Maas y Mas''']]

a: 9, b: 1 - '''kirsch''' 
Kirschwasser, German for "cherry water", often known simply as Kirsch ("cherry"), is a clear cherry brandy. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirsch Wikipedia] The mention of "kirsch" in the first sentence begins a considerable sequence of references to Germany, German words or German history through Chapter 1.

a: 9, b: 1 - '''Pierce Inverarity''' 
Pynchon & Company (an East Coast Brokerage house) fell apart in 1931, E.A. Pierce (a larger financial institution) picked up that company's holdings. Thus 'Pierce'. See [http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50910FE3E5F11738DDDAC0A94DC405B818FF1D3 "EXCHANGE SUSPENDS PYNCHON & COMPANY, New York Times April 25, 1931]. [RL]

a: 9, b: 1 - '''California real estate mogul''' 
Many of the terms and concepts in 'The Crying of Lot 49' are derived from laws concerning property and investment. The ancestors of Thomas Ruggles Pynchon [apparentlty the fifth Pynchon to be so named] had much involvement in real estate and property laws. See [http://books.google.com/books?id=asAOAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA51&dq=Stearns+pynchon+springfield&as_brr=1#PPP1,M1 '''''. . . . the Petition of the Springfield Aquaduct'''''], pages 44 - 53. Also see [http://tinyurl.com/2gb8aa '''''Popular Law Library'''''] and go to page 95. [RL]

a: 9, b: 1 - '''greenish dead eye of the TV tube, spoke the name of God. . . .''' 
Regarding the TV/God connection: the notion that Television has supplanted God by the mid-sixties.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Mazatlán''' 
City in the mexican state of Sinaloa, located on the Pacific coast of Mexico, east from the southernmost tip of the Baja California peninsula. It is worth mentioning that a large wave of German immigrants arrived in the mid 1800s, developing Mazatlán into a thriving commercial seaport. Additionally, Mazatlán played a role in the California gold rush, with people traveling by boat from Mazatlán to San Francisco. Pynchon is placed in Mexico (at least, Mexico City) throughout the 1960s. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazatlan Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Cornell University''' 
Ivy league university located in Ithaca, New York. Pynchon began studies in engineering physics in 1953, but left after two years to serve in the U.S. Navy. In 1957, Pynchon returned with a focus in English, a BA he received in 1959. "The Small Rain", Pynchon's first published story, was printed in the ''Cornell Writer'' in May, 1959. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pynchon#Childhood_and_education Wikipedia: Pynchon][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornell_University Wikipedia: Cornell]

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Bartók Concerto for Orchestra''' 
Five-movement musical work finished in 1943 by Hungarian composer Béla Bartók (1881 - 1945), after his native exile to the United States in response to the rise of the Nazi party. Bartók is one of a number of references to the theme of "exile" in this first chapter.

The critic Charles Hollander suggests that the fourth movement is neither "dry" nor "disconsolate," and that Pynchon deliberately reversed the facts to bring attention to Bartók's status as a political exile. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bartok Wikipedia Bartók][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concerto_for_Orchestra_(Bart%C3%B3k)#Fourth_movement Wikipedia: Concerto][http://www.vheissu.info/art/art_eng_49_hollander.htm Hollander Essay]
:"Dry and disconsolate" are not facts but opinions, although the consensus opinion might be "facts". Pynchon may have described the movement as it sounded to him (or his character).
:For more, see the [[Talk:Chapter_1|Discussion page]].

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Jay Gould''' 
(1836 – 1892) Infamous American financier (known as the "Mephistopheles of Wall Street"), who became a leading American railroad builder and speculator in the mid 19th century. In 1869, the Fisk-Gould Scandal (also known as Black Friday) spread financial panic as a result of Gould and fellow financier James Fisk's efforts to corner the gold market. Further political scandals and unfair dealings have cemented his reputation (both throughout his life and during the century after his death) as one of the most unethical of the 19th century American robber barons. It is worth note that the bust of Jay Gould is the "only ikon in the house" of Pierce Inverarity, and that Oedipa expressed the fear that it (on a shelf over the bed) would "someday topple on them". [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Gould Wikipedia: Gould][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_%281869%29 Wikipedia: Black Friday]

<div id="warpe">a: 10, b: 2 - '''Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus'''</div>
Law firm representing Pierce Inverarity.

:"Warpe," possible reference to the municipality of Warpe located in the district of Nienburg, in Lower Saxony, Germany (Germany and Nazism being referenced thoroughly in Chapter 1). [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warpe Wikipedia]

:"Kubitschek" is possibly drawn from Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira (1902 - 1976), a Brazilian social reformer and 24th President of Brazil (1956 - 1961) who went into a self-imposed exile after a military coup d'état, which had later been claimed to have been taking as a preemptive measure to deter an "inevitable communist revolution" (the coup having been tacitly (and directly) assisted and supported by the United States government and the CIA)--this is another in a series of anecdotal references to "exile" as well as a potential comment on United States foreign policy. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juscelino_Kubitschek Wikipedia: Kubitschek][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazilian_1964_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat Wikipedia: 1964 Brazilian Coup]

:"McMingus" is a probable nod toward Jazz legend Charles Mingus (1922 - 1979). Pynchon is a lifelong Jazz fan, making this unlikely to be a coincidence. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Mingus Wikipedia]

:Pynchon's penchant for absurd, punning law firm names is continued in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=S#salitieri ''Gravity's Rainbow''] with Salitieri, Poore, Nash, De Brutus and Short.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Metzger''' 
Co-executor of Inverarity's will and signatory of the letter Oedipa receives in Chapter 1. Metzger is German for "butcher", and could also be a reference to Wolfgang Metzger (1899 - 1979), a german psychologist who served as one of the main representatives of Gestalt psychology, a theory that proposes that the operational principle of the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies; or, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. This concept will recur later in the chapter, under the term "Triptych". Additionally, the introduction of Dr Hilarius, a German psychologist, will strengthen this association. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Metzger Wikipedia: Metzger][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt_psychology Wikipedia: Gestalt].

:[http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metzgerpost Metzgerpost] ("butcher post") was an early type of mail service in the western regions of the Holy Roman Empire, superseded by the Thurn und Taxis-dominated imperial system. 

Compare '''Meztger''' to [http://www.csp.org/chrestomathy/unfolding_self.html '''Ralph Metzner'''], co-author with [http://www.timothyleary.us/ '''Timothy Leary'''] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ram_Dass '''Richard Alpert'''], also known as [http://www.ramdass.org/ '''Ram Dass'''], of [http://tinyurl.com/337xqe '''The Psychedelic Experience''']. 

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Kinneret-Among-The-Pines''' 
Fictional California town that Oedipa Maas resides in. Yam Kinneret (Sea of Kinnereth) is the modern Hebrew name for the Sea of Galilee, Israel's largest freshwater lake. Upon the shores of Galilee, much of the ministry of Christ was said to have occurred, among which include His Sermon on the Mount, as well as the miracles of His walking on water, calming a storm, and feeding the
multitude with five loaves of bread and two fish. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_of_Galilee Wikipedia]. During the years Pynchon was working on 'The Crying of Lot 49, College buddy [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Fariña '''Richard Farina'''] lived in [http://ci.carmel.ca.us/ '''Carmel by the Sea'''].

a: 10, b: 2 - '''settecento''' 
''Settecento'' is Italian for seven hundred, and is the standard Italian term for the 18th century (the 1700s). It is used in English mostly to refer to art-historical and architectural movements and styles of that period. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Settecento Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''variorum''' 
A work containing all known varients of a text whereby all variations and emendations are set side-by-side to track textual decisions. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variorum Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Vivaldi Kazoo Concerto''' 
Kazoos appear in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/ ''Gravity's Rainbow'']. The title isn't as outlandish as it may seem; Vivaldi's concerti are often performed on instruments they were not written for. Example: [http://idrs.colorado.edu/Publications/DR/DR7.1/vivaldi.html concerto for two cellos] recast for bassoon trio. Cross referenced search of kazoos in the Gravity's Rainbow Wiki: [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=B ][http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Songs/Compositions ][http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=H ][http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=O ][http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Dope_in_Gravity%27s_Rainbow]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Boyd Beaver''' 
Soloist for the Vivaldi Kazoo Concerto. "Boyd" might stem from the Gaelic word for "blond", while "Beaver" is a chiefly American slang term for female genitalia, possibly prompting the image of a blonde vagina playing a kazoo. One might also take "Boy", evoked by "Boyd", combined with the "female" beaver, and find the same gender-bending implied in Oedipa's name itself (or in a male author writing a female protagonist, or the Muse inspiring the poet). The name also bears an obvious resemblance to Zoyd Wheeler, the protagonist of ''Vineland'', though he played the keyboard.

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Wendell ("Mucho") Maas''' 
"Mucho más" is common Spanish phrase, meaning "much more." Mucho Maas reappears in [http://vineland.pynchonwiki.com/wiki ''Vineland''].

:''Maas'' is also Dutch for ''mesh'' and ''loophole'' (in the architectural and the figurative sense as well), which may be related to the book's treatement of webs or networks.

:The near-likeness "mass" becomes an important word/concept in ''Gravity's Rainbow'' and, especially, ''Against The Day'', although the associative meanings do not seem to mesh.! [[User:MKOHUT|MKOHUT]] 13:42, 11 July 2007 (PDT)

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Pachuco dialect''' 
Pachucos were Mexican American youth who developed their own subculture during the 1930s and 1940s in the Southwestern United States. They wore distinctive clothes (such as Zoot Suits) and spoke their own dialect (Caló). [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pachuco Wikipedia] Zoot suits appear a few times in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/ ''Gravity's Rainbow''].

a: 11, b: 2 - '''chingas and maricones''' 
Spanish slang words. "Chingas" is a conjugation of the word "chingar" (slang for "to fuck"), translating "chingas" as "[you] fuck" (or, better, just a plural of "chinga"). "Maricones" refers to the term "maricón" (based on the word "marica" or "male homosexual") which is equivalent to the English insult "faggot".

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Lamont Cranston''' 

[[image:The-Shadow_1939.jpg|right|thumb|150px|The Shadow comic]]One identity adopted by The Shadow, a character of pulp fiction, radio shows, and comic books. Cranston was a wealthy young man about town. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shadow Wikipedia]

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shadow '''The Shadow'''] first appeared on radio in 1930. The banking institution Pynchon & Company collapsed in 1931. The last words Oedipa hears from Pierce:
:"I heard that," Pierce said. "I think it's time Wendell Maas had a little visit from the Shadow."
were spoken a year before she received the letter from Warpe, Wistful, Kubitschek and McMingus.

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Commissioner Weston... Professor Quackenbush''' 
Police [http://www.angelfire.com/yt/Weston/ '''Commissioner Weston'''] was the [http://theshadowfan.com/theshadowfan/past-shadow/movies/the-shadow-serial-1940/ '''Shadow's'''] friend and running mate. [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028772/ '''Professor Quackenbush'''] could be a reference to Dr. Hackenbush from [http://www.evl.uic.edu/pape/Marx/films/posters/DayAtTheRaces2.jpg '''Day at the Races''']. There is a Professor Quackenbush in two Three Stooges shorts, Half-Wits Holiday (Vernon Dent) and Pies and Guys (Milton Frome).

a: 13 b: 4 -'''I don't believe in any of it, Oed''' 
The short form of Oedipa "Oed" means "boring" in German.

a: 13, b: 4 - '''Mucho shaved his ... throw them further off''' 
All of the references in this section refer to the stereotypical (often Italian) used car salesman with greased back hair, a very short mustache, and huge lapels on his suit.

[[Image:jacklemmon.jpg|90px|thumb|left|Jack Lemmon and his hair in the 60s]]a: 13, b: 4 - '''used only water, combing it like Jack Lemmon''' 
American actor (1925-2001). He became a favorite actor of director Billy Wilder, starring in his films ''Some Like It Hot'', ''The Apartment'' and others. Wilder felt Lemmon had a natural tendency toward overacting that had to be tempered; the Wilder biography ''Nobody's Perfect'' quotes the director as saying: "Lemmon, I would describe him as a ham, a fine ham, and with ham you have to trim a little fat." [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_lemmon Wikipedia]

a: 13, b: 4 - '''creampuff''' 
A very well maintained used car. 

a: 16, b: 7 - '''Dr. Hilarius, her shrink or psychotherapist''' 
[[Image:Hilarius.jpg|right|thumb|St. Hilarius|150px]]According to the Wikipedia, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Hilarius '''Pope Saint Hilarius'''] was Pope of the Roman Catholic Church from 461 to February 28, 468). He was canonized as a saint after his death. The Sardinian archdeacon of Rome, Hilarius was elected bishop of Rome probably November 17, 461, and was consecrated November 19, 461 and died on February 28 (?), 468.

As archdeacon under Pope Leo I he fought vigorously for the rights of the Roman See and vigorously opposed the condemnation of Flavian of Constantinople at the Second Council of Ephesus in 449 to settle the question of Eutyches. According to a letter to the Empress Pulcheria, collected among the letter of Leo I, Hilarus apologizes for not delivering to her the pope's letter after the synod. . . .

Shrink is a shortened form of headshrinker, which is 50s slang. The OED cites 'shrink' in this text of 1966, as the first recorded written use of it as a slang term. Which must be why Pynchon defined it in the text.

a: 17, b: 8 - '''LSD-25, mescaline, psilocybin''' 
These hallucinogenic drugs are also mentioned in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/ ''''''Gravity's Rainbow''''']. LSD gets a special mention as an agent of spiritual awareness in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vineland '''''Vineland''''']. See notes for [http://cl49.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Chapter_6 '''She Loves You''] on page a: 143, b: 117 of CoL49 wiki, where Mucho Maas is expressing ideas about psychedelics concordant with the writings of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley '''Aldous Huxley'''.] Peyote's magical potential is rendered on pages 392-394 of Against the Day, in wholy favorable terms, with the connection of divinatory powers and envisioning agents such as [http://www.britannica.com/eb/topic-405965/Native-American-Church '''Hikuli'''] displayed in a very favorable light.

It remains an open question as to whether and to what extent Pynchon took or was influenced by them. ([http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Smoking_Dope_with_Thomas_Pynchon "whether"?])

a: 18, b:8 - '''lapses from orthodoxy''' 
Orthodox Freudian psychotherapy involved the therapist literally trying not to impose himself at all on the patient. That's why the therapist is often shown sitting behind the patient. The goal is to be a blank canvas and have the patient paint his problems on the therapist, thereby bringing them into consciousness.

[[Image:rorschach1.jpg|150px|thumb|right|The first of the ten cards in the Rorschach inkblot test]]
a: 18, b: 8 - '''Rorschach blot''' 
The Rorschach inkblot test (Pronounced roar-shock) is a method of psychological evaluation. Psychologists use this test to try to examine the personality characteristics and emotional functioning of their patients. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rorschach_inkblot_test Wikipedia]

[[Image:rorschachcomic1.png|thumb|150px|right|Rorschach, a comic book character in ''Watchmen'']]
a: 18, b: 8 - '''a face is symmetrical like a Rorschach blot''' 
In the graphic novel, ''Watchmen'', written by Alan Moore, there is a character named Rorschach who wears a mask with a Rorscach blot on the front. Moore is a self-professed Pynchon fan: he referenced [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V. ''V.''] in ''V for Vendetta'' and has mentioned [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/ ''Gravity's Rainbow''] in interview. It is possible, not to say probable, that Moore was inspired by this line.

a: 18, b: 8 - '''TAT picture''' 
The TAT is popularly known as the picture interpretation technique because it uses a standard series of 31 provocative yet ambiguous pictures about which the subject must tell a story. It was developed by American psychologists in the 1930s. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thematic_Apperception_Test Wikipedia]

a: 18, b: 9 - '''Fu-Manchu''' 
Dr. Fu Manchu is a fictional character, an evil genius of Chinese origin, first featured in a series of novels by Birmingham author Sax Rohmer during the first half of the 20th century. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu_Manchu Wikipedia]

a: 18, b: 9 - '''Perry Mason''' 
Perry Mason is a fictional defense attorney who originally appeared in detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner. Mason was portrayed by Raymond Burr in a television series which ran on CBS from 1957 to 1966. The typical plot involves Perry Mason unmasking the actual murderer in a final dramatic courtroom showdown. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Mason Wikipedia]

a: 19, b: 9 - '''''The Profession v. Perry Mason...''''' 
Roseman may be trying to undermine Perry Mason by arguing that the dramatic courtroom twists in the TV show are actually uncommon in the American legal system.

[[Image:remediosvaro.jpg|thumb|175px|''Bornando el manto terrestre'', 1961|left]]
a: 21, b: 11 - '''Bornando el Manto Terrestre''' 
Remedios Varo (1908 - 1963) was a surrealist painter. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remedios_Varo Wikipedia]

Bill Brown [http://www.notbored.org/crying.html notes] that "Pynchon saw Bordando el Manto Terrestre when, as part of the first full retrospective of the painter's work, it was displayed at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City in 1964, a year after her death at the age of 55. Painted in 1961, el Manto (oil on masonite, roughly 40 by 48 inches) is the central panel in an autobiographical triptych. It is possible that Pynchon, writing ''Lot 49'' in 1965, recalled the painting from memory or incomplete notes, and not with a reproduction of it set in front of him. He gets a lot wrong."

[[image:bubble-shades.jpg|thumb|Bubble Shades|120px|right]]
a:21, b:11 - '''she wore dark green bubble shades''' 
This is the sixties, after all...

{{CL49 PbP}}