Thomas Pynchon Wiki - User contributions [en]

Chapter 4

2007-04-04T16:34:46Z

Volver: Bloody Chiclets

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a: 83, b: ? - '''everything she saw, smelled''' 
Although the novel delves more into Tristero in later pages, this sentence may suggest that it can be interpreted as far more than an actual secret organization, perhaps some metaphor for paranoia as a whole, in which everything experienced (saw, smelled, dreamed, remembered) by the paranoiac seems to connect to some great conspiracy.

a: 83, b: ? - '''Clayton "Bloody" Chiclitz''' 
Chiclets are a famous brand of candy-coated chewing gum. The sentence "After the fight he was spitting out bloody Chiclets" means he had had some teeth knocked out; incisors are about the size and shape of Chiclets. 
This character also appears in ''V.'' (55; the munitions king; 152; president of Yoyodyne, Inc., 226-27) and ''Gravity's Rainbow'' (558-62): "about as fat as Marvy and wears hornrimmed glasses, and the top of his head's as shiny as his face"; American industrialist with T-Force scouting German engineering (esp. secret weaponry); owns a toy factory in Nutley, NJ; he's running a fur operation, employing 30 kids whom he eventually wants to take to Hollywood to be movie stars.

a: 83, b: ? - '''Aura Lee''' 
"Aura Lee" (also known as "Aura Lea") is an American Civil War song about a maiden. The Elvis Presley song "Love Me Tender" (lyric by Ken Darby) is sung to the same tune as "Aura Lee". [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aura_Lee Wikipedia]

a: 84, b: ? - '''Kirby sent me''' 
She saw Kirby's name back on page 52.

a: 86, b: ? - '''James Clerk Maxwell''' 
(1831 – 1879) was a Scottish mathematician and theoretical physicist. His most significant achievement was formulating a set of equations — eponymously named Maxwell's equations — that for the first time expressed the basic laws of electricity and magnetism in a unified fashion. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Clerk_Maxwell Wikipedia]

a: 86, b: ? - '''Maxwell's demon''' 
Pynchon explains it pretty well. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell%27s_demon Wikipedia]
:Pynchon may have been read about the demon in the writings of historian Henry Adams, whose ''Education of Henry Adams'' Pynchon cites approvingly in other works. In Adams' manuscript, ''The Rule of Phase Applied to History'', attempted to use Maxwell's demon as an historical metaphor, though he seems to have misunderstood and misapplied the principle.

a: 88, b: ? - '''in school they got brainwashed''' 
Pynchon studied engineering physics at Cornell before joining the Navy and ultimately graduating with a degree in English. His portrayal of Koteks seems to be an indictment on the sad state of the profession of engineering in the corporate age, when patents are in the hands of corporations instead of pioneering inventors like Edison.

a: 91, b: ? - '''it was all mixed up with a Porky Pig cartoon''' 
Pynchon's novels also incorporate a heavy cartoonish element. Porky Pig appears as a tattoo in ''Gravity's Rainbow''. Pynchon is reported to be a fan of pigs in general and it's been suggested that his affinity for Porky stems from his stutter.
[[Image:ponystamp.jpg|thumb|150px|right|80th Anniversary of the Pony Express stamp, 1940]]
a: 94, b: ? - '''Genghis Cohen, philatelist''' 
Philately is the study of revenue or postage stamps.

In 1966, the novelist Romain Gary accused Pynchon of stealing the name Genghis Cohen from one of his books. Pynchon penned a humorous [http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_essays_cohen.html reply] in a letter to the editor of the New York Times Book Review.

a: 94, b: ? - '''I picked the dandelions in a cemetary''' 
Like the charcoal from bones turned into ink and cigarette filters, dead people are once again being recycled.

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Chapter 3

2007-03-26T21:38:32Z

Volver: Mike Fallopian

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a: 47, b: ? - '''Yoyodyne''' 
The company also appears in ''V.''.

[[Image:oscilloscope.gif|thumb|right|200px|Lissajous figures on an oscilloscope, with 90 degrees phase difference between x and y inputs.]]
a: 47, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''Stockhausen''' 
Karlheinz Stockhausen (b. 1928) is 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. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karlheinz_Stockhausen Wikipedia]

a: 48, b: ? - '''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.

a: 49, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: 53, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''reconstruction of some European pleasure-casino''' 
Perhaps the Casino Hermann Goering from ''Gravity's Rainbow''?

a: 57, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''Godzilla II''' 
There seems to be some kind of joke from somewhere that Pynchon was rumored to be writing a novel aboubt Godzilla and Mothra at some point... More???

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

a: 58, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''Lago di Pietà''' 
An actual historical event?

a: 63, b: ? - '''The Courier's Tragedy''' 
See [[Making sense of The Courier's Tragedy]]

a: 64, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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]

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

a: 66, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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]

a: 67, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''picket the V.A.''' 
what's the VA?

a: 76, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''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.

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Chapter 1

2007-03-26T14:01:38Z

Volver:

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a: 9, b: ? - '''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.

:Oedipa's name is probably pronounced in the American fashion, ED-i-pa, not British fashion, EED-i-pa, because Mucho uses the short form "Oed," which almost has to be ED.

:A further comic level in the name Oedipa: It looks like a feminization of ''Oedipus,'' which is a Latin name derived from the Greek ''Oidipous.'' While ''-pus'' has the look of a word-ending that might alternate between masculine and feminine forms, like proper names ''Julius/Julia'' or adjectives ''sanctus/sanctum/sancta,'' in fact it stands in for Greek ''-pous,'' meaning "foot," a form that doesn't alternate. (All feet are the same gender no matter who's wearing them.) Whoever coined the name Oedipa pretended to know a little more than they really did.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Mazatlán''' 
a Mexican city on Mexico's Pacific coast. Pynchon lived in Mexico during parts of the 1960s.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Cornell University''' 
Pynchon's alma mater.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Jay Gould''' 
(1836 – 1892) was an American financier, who became a leading American railroad builder and speculator. In his lifetime and for a century after, Gould had a firm reputation as the most unethical of the 19th century American businessmen known as robber barons. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Gould Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus''' 
As Pynchon is a lifelong Jazz fan, the final name could be a nod to jazz legend Charles Mingus.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Kinneret-Among-The-Pines''' 
Fictional California town. Kinneret is the modern Hebrew name for the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_of_Galilee Sea of Galilee] in Israel, upon the shores of which much of ministry of Jesus occurred.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''settecento''' 
Settecento is the Italian word for seven hundred, and is the standard Italian term for the 18th century (not the 17th century, but the years beginning with 17). In English, it refers to styles of that period.

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.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Boyd Beaver''' 
The name sounds suspiciously similar to Zoyd Wheeler, the protagonist of ''Vineland''.

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Wendell ("Mucho") Maas''' 
"Mucho más" is common Spanish phrase, meaning "much more."

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 for "fuck" and "faggot".

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

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Commissioner Weston... Professor Quackenbush''' 
?

[[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: 16, b: ? - '''Dr. Hilarius, her shrink or psychotherapist''' 
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'']. It remains an open question as to whether and to what extent Pynchon took or was influenced by them. ([http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/agordon/pynchon.htm "whether"?])

[[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...

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Chapter 1

2007-03-26T14:00:16Z

Volver: Oedipa's name

{{CL49 PbP Text}}
 

a: 9, b: ? - '''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.

:Oedipa's name is probably pronounced in the American fashion, ED-i-pa, not British fashion, EED-i-pa, because Mucho uses the short form "Oed," which almost has to be ED.

:A further comic level in the name Oedipa: It looks like a feminization of ''Oedipus,'' which is a Latin name derived from the Greek ''Oidipous.'' While ''-pus'' has the look of a word-ending that might alternate between masculine and feminine forms (like proper names ''Julius/Julia'' or adjectives ''sanctus/sanctum/sancta,'' in fact it stands in for Greek ''-pous,'' meaning "foot," a form that doesn't alternate. (All feet are the same gender no matter who's wearing them.) Whoever coined the name Oedipa pretended to know a little more than they really did.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Mazatlán''' 
a Mexican city on Mexico's Pacific coast. Pynchon lived in Mexico during parts of the 1960s.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Cornell University''' 
Pynchon's alma mater.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Jay Gould''' 
(1836 – 1892) was an American financier, who became a leading American railroad builder and speculator. In his lifetime and for a century after, Gould had a firm reputation as the most unethical of the 19th century American businessmen known as robber barons. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Gould Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus''' 
As Pynchon is a lifelong Jazz fan, the final name could be a nod to jazz legend Charles Mingus.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Kinneret-Among-The-Pines''' 
Fictional California town. Kinneret is the modern Hebrew name for the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_of_Galilee Sea of Galilee] in Israel, upon the shores of which much of ministry of Jesus occurred.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''settecento''' 
Settecento is the Italian word for seven hundred, and is the standard Italian term for the 18th century (not the 17th century, but the years beginning with 17). In English, it refers to styles of that period.

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.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Boyd Beaver''' 
The name sounds suspiciously similar to Zoyd Wheeler, the protagonist of ''Vineland''.

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Wendell ("Mucho") Maas''' 
"Mucho más" is common Spanish phrase, meaning "much more."

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 for "fuck" and "faggot".

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

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Commissioner Weston... Professor Quackenbush''' 
?

[[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: 16, b: ? - '''Dr. Hilarius, her shrink or psychotherapist''' 
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'']. It remains an open question as to whether and to what extent Pynchon took or was influenced by them. ([http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/agordon/pynchon.htm "whether"?])

[[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}}

Chapter 1

2007-03-23T16:41:04Z

Volver: Kazoo Concerto

{{CL49 PbP Text}}
 

a: 9, b: ? - '''Oedipa''' 
I think you have to pronounce the name American fashion, ED-i-pa, not British fashion, EED-i-pa, because Mucho uses the short form "Oed," which almost has to be ED.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Mazatlán''' 
a Mexican city on Mexico's Pacific coast. Pynchon lived in Mexico during parts of the 1960s.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Cornell University''' 
Pynchon's alma mater.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Jay Gould''' 
(1836 – 1892) was an American financier, who became a leading American railroad builder and speculator. In his lifetime and for a century after, Gould had a firm reputation as the most unethical of the 19th century American businessmen known as robber barons. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Gould Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus''' 
As Pynchon is a lifelong Jazz fan, the final name could be a nod to jazz legend Charles Mingus.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Kinneret-Among-The-Pines''' 
Fictional California town. Kinneret is the modern Hebrew name for the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_of_Galilee Sea of Galilee] in Israel, upon the shores of which much of ministry of Jesus occurred.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''settecento''' 
Settecento is the Italian word for seven hundred, and is the standard Italian term for the 18th century (not the 17th century, but the years beginning with 17). In English, it refers to styles of that period.

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.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Boyd Beaver''' 
The name sounds suspiciously similar to Zoyd Wheeler, the protagonist of ''Vineland''.

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Wendell ("Mucho") Maas''' 
"Mucho más" is common Spanish phrase, meaning "much more."

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 for "fuck" and "faggot".

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

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Commissioner Weston... Professor Quackenbush''' 
?

[[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: 16, b: ? - '''Dr. Hilarius, her shrink or psychotherapist''' 
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'']. It remains an open question as to whether and to what extent Pynchon took or was influenced by them. ("whether"? ...) [http://z11.invisionfree.com/thefictionalwoods/index.php?s=3b2d4280876fbd2ed40d5344691a990f&showtopic=400]

[[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}}

Chapter 1

2007-03-23T16:31:49Z

Volver: Oedipa: pronunciation

{{CL49 PbP Text}}
 

a: 9, b: ? - '''Oedipa''' 
I think you have to pronounce the name American fashion, ED-i-pa, not British fashion, EED-i-pa, because Mucho uses the short form "Oed," which almost has to be ED.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Mazatlán''' 
a Mexican city on Mexico's Pacific coast. Pynchon lived in Mexico during parts of the 1960s.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Cornell University''' 
Pynchon's alma mater.

a: 10, b: 1 - '''Jay Gould''' 
(1836 – 1892) was an American financier, who became a leading American railroad builder and speculator. In his lifetime and for a century after, Gould had a firm reputation as the most unethical of the 19th century American businessmen known as robber barons. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Gould Wikipedia]

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Warpe, Wistfull, Kubitschek and McMingus''' 
As Pynchon is a lifelong Jazz fan, the final name could be a nod to jazz legend Charles Mingus.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Kinneret-Among-The-Pines''' 
Fictional California town. Kinneret is the modern Hebrew name for the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_of_Galilee Sea of Galilee] in Israel, upon the shores of which much of ministry of Jesus occurred.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''settecento''' 
Settecento is the Italian word for seven hundred, and is the standard Italian term for the 18th century (not the 17th century, but the years beginning with 17). In English, it refers to styles of that period.

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Vivaldi Kazoo Concerto''' 
Kazoos appear in [http://gravitys-rainbow.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/ ''Gravity's Rainbow''].

a: 10, b: 2 - '''Boyd Beaver''' 
The name sounds suspiciously similar to Zoyd Wheeler, the protagonist of ''Vineland''.

a: 11, b: 2 - '''Wendell ("Mucho") Maas''' 
"Mucho más" is common Spanish phrase, meaning "much more."

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 for "fuck" and "faggot".

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

a: 11, b: 3 - '''Commissioner Weston... Professor Quackenbush''' 
?

[[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: 16, b: ? - '''Dr. Hilarius, her shrink or psychotherapist''' 
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'']. It remains an open question as to whether and to what extent Pynchon took or was influenced by them. ("whether"? ...) [http://z11.invisionfree.com/thefictionalwoods/index.php?s=3b2d4280876fbd2ed40d5344691a990f&showtopic=400]

[[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}}

Chapter 2

2007-03-19T20:42:56Z

Volver: Bogatir, gaidamak, Birch Society

{{CL49 PbP Text}}
 

a: 23, b: ? - '''Sick Dick and the Volkswagens''' 
Fictional, but a 1970s New York City punk band adopted the name. [http://black2com.blogspot.com/2006/03/black-to-comm-back-issue-update-hey-ya.html] "I Want to Kiss Your Feet" no doubt an allusion to the 1963 Beatles hit, "I Want to Hold Your Hand." Might this mean that Pynchon was fond of the Beatles but "did not believe in" them?

a: 24, b: ? - '''printed circuit''' 
Many people have undoubtedly seen civilization from a plane or high place and been reminded of a circuit board, but this description is probably one of, if not the first time it's been set down in American fiction.

a: 25, b: ? - '''believe in his job''' 
Echoes the "believe in" language from two pages back. Pynchon is drawing a metaphor between "believing in" a band and "believing in" a job.

a: 25, b: ? - '''religious instant''' 
May be a stretch, but Pynchon's works seem to have many such "religious instants," in which a character experiences a flood of ideas and emotions in just a few moments. Similar to the "Proustian moment" or Joycean epiphany?

a: 25, b: ? - '''giants of the aerospace industry''' 
Pynchon worked as a technical writer at Boeing from 1960-62.

a: 26, b: ? - '''horse''' 
Heroin.

a: 26, b: ? - '''the Paranoids''' 
Some fan has made a mock-up of what a CD by The Paranoids might look like, [http://www.entropic-empire.com/cds/paranoids.html here].

a: 30, b: ? - '''Gallipoli''' 
The Battle of Gallipoli took place at Gallipoli from April 1915 to December 1915 during the First World War. A joint British and French operation was mounted in an effort to eventually capture the Ottoman capital of Constantinople (Istanbul). The attempt failed, with heavy casualties on both sides. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gallipoli Wikipedia]

a: 31, b: ? - '''hierophany''' 
Physical manifestation of the holy or sacred. This manifestation can be in many forms, often in symbols or rituals. An example of a hierophany would be an apparition or image appearing on a window bearing resemblance to the virgin Mary.

a: 31, b: ? - '''Book of the Dead''' 
ancient Egyptian funerary text used by the ancient Egyptians as a set of instructions for the afterlife. Not all the spells were used for every burial; some depended on wealth and status. Some spells were gifts to the gods, while other were used so the person could walk, a spell for not dying again in the afterlife, and even a spell 'For preventing a man from going upside down and from eating feces' [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_the_Dead Wikipedia]

a: 31, b: ? - '''singling up all lines 
Pynchon was in the Navy for a spell and "single up all lines" is a common nautical term. Ships are docked with lines doubled -- that is, with two sets of ropes or chains holding the vessel to the dock. To "single up all lines" is to remove the redundant second lines in preparation to make way.

Pynchon uses this term in almost all his novels, notably as the first sentence of ''Against the Day.'' For more, see [http://against-the-day.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=ATD_1-25#Page_3 ATD page 3].

a: 33, b: ? - '''a cash nexus''' 
?

a: 33, b: ? - '''Manni di Presso''' 
Manic depression?

a: 36, b: ? - '''Botticelli''' 
Botticelli is a guessing game which requires the players to have a good knowledge of biographical details of famous people. The game has several variants, but the common theme is that one person or team thinks of a famous person, reveals their initial letter, and then answers yes/no questions to allow other players to guess the identity. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botticelli_%28game%29 Wikipedia]

[[Image:oscilloscope.gif|thumb|right|200px|Lissajous figures on an oscilloscope, with 90 degrees phase difference between x and y inputs.]]
a: 47, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''Stockhausen''' 
Karlheinz Stockhausen (b. 1928) is 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. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karlheinz_Stockhausen Wikipedia]

a: 48, b: ? - '''Mike Fallopian''' 
Obviously, Fallopian tubes are two very fine tubes leading from the ovaries of female mammals into the uterus.

a: 49, b: ? - '''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: ? - '''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: ? - '''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.

An especially chilling joke because Fallopian is '''serious.''' The PPS is so far to the right that the JBS looks airy-fairily liberal.

a: 51, b: ? - '''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 Pinguid Society 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.

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