GRGR 18 - 19

About the site

Curriculum vitae

The Book

Books archive

First Drafts

Lola's diary

Free-writing

Links

contact Jeremy
contact Ellen

A passage near the beginning of Slothrop and Greta's first sex, on p. 396, made me stop and think:

Something... that dreams Prussian and wintering across their meadows, in whatever cursive lash-marks wait across the flesh of their sky so bleak, so incapable of any sheltering, waiting to be summoned... No. No -- he still says "their," but he knows better. His meadows, his sky... his own cruelty.

Ok. Well first of all, what is the referent for "their"? "Something that dreams Prussian"? "Somebody" who has "already educated him"? (This would, of course, be Katje; but why would she, from Holland, "dream Prussian"?) (It's not "Them", judging from the lower-case.) My guess is that "their" is Slothrop's picture of the German man, which he has got primarily from movie images. It's a way of foreshadowing Franz Pökler's fetishes. It also ties in nicely with Leni Pökler's picture of the German man, back on p. 162 (and thanks to Seb T. for pointing out the location of this passage):

On their backs in the meadows and mountains, watching the sky, masturbating, yearning. Destiny waits, a darkness latent in the texture of the summer wind.

Note the repeated reference to the meadows, the sky. For Leni, the "man" is the "other"; for Slothrop, the "German" is the "other". "But he knows better." He has become the other. I'm not sure what it means here that Slothrop is turning into a German; except I think it has to do with his sense of identity weakening, the borders of his personality becoming fuzzy and translucent.