Thomas Pynchon Wiki - User contributions [en]

ATD 397-428

2006-12-20T00:48:32Z

Btchakir: /* Page 409 */

:'''<big>Please keep these annotations SPOILER-FREE by not revealing information from later pages in the novel.</big>''' 

==Page 397==

'''syntonic wireless''' 
???

'''street-Arab''' 
???

'''Columbian ''Half-Dollar''''' 
???

==Page 398==

'''nuncio''' 
???

'''Evening Quarters''' 
???

'''H.G. Wells''' 
Herbert George Wells (1866-1946), one of the 19th Century science fiction writers whom Pynchon is both emulating and parodying in ''ATD''. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.G._Wells Wikipedia entry].

'''jeu d'esprit''' 
???

'''on the subject''' 
???

'''National Imprest''' 
???

'''"Plug" Loafsley''' 
Plug-ugly loafer/oaf?

'''Lollipop Lounge''' 
???

'''turned out''' 
(When? Before or after first visit?)

'''Tenderloin''' 
???

'''squalid empire''' 
Cf Alan Parker's 1976 movie "Bugsy Malone". [http://imdb.com/title/tt0074256/ IMDb]

==Page 399==

'''indigo... yellow''' 
Clashing-colors motif.

'''dicer''' 
???

'''opopanax''' 
Typo for 'opoponax'. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opoponax Wikipedia]

'''vervain''' 
???

'''slide cornet''' 
???

'''mandola''' 
An eight-stringed instrument shaped like a mandolin but tuned the same as a viola.

'''"tin pan" piano''' 
???

'''houris''' 
???

'''Darby''' 
Over 21yo, if he's aged.

==Page 400==

'''paillettes''' 
???

'''louche''' 
???

'''"jazz"''' 
(When did the spelling change?)

'''high-hats''' 
???

'''Missus Grundy''' 
???

''''ying'''' 
"Yen"?

==Page 401==

'''Angela Grace''' 
Angel of Grace?

'''Gophiz... Hudson Dustuhs''' 
Gophers, Hudson Dusters.

'''slickin up''' 
Gentrification.

'''Mr. Mawgin''' 
J. Pierpont Morgan.

'''stanchion''' 
???

'''find it''' 
(Small-penis joke.)

'''I AM THE WAY''' 
???

'''triatomic''' 
Ozone = O3.

==Page 402==

'''solenoidal relay''' 
???

'''Dr. Zoot''' 
???

'''pale''' 
Even tough-guy Plug fears time machine.

'''dynamo''' 
???

'''Grandmother's day''' 
Pre-Civil War.

'''Breguet''' 
(Date?)

'''shimming''' 
???

'''revenue diverted''' 
(Why not no-revenue?)

==Page 403==

'''coaming''' 
???

'''undog this hatch''' 
???

'''faith''' 
(Blind, not humble.)

'''nervous organizations''' 
Cf drugs.

'''pillioned''' 
???

'''horses''' 
???

'''arrays of metallic points''' 
???

==Page 404==

'''shockwaves of the Creation''' 
Anachronistic Big Bang theory?

'''chamber shook''' 
(It didn't on p403.)

'''not beasts''' 
Airplanes?

'''smell''' 
Cf GR on Passchendaele.

==Page 405==

'''latest Oldsmobile''' 
(Dates.)

'''Candlebrow U.''' 
???

'''double-domes''' 
???

'''drumming''' 
Traveling salesmanship.

'''Ball in Hand''' 
???

'''Alonzo Meatman''' 
???

==Page 406==

'''''Imum Coeli''''' 
???

'''Gideon Candlebrow''' 
???

'''Grossdale''' 
???

==Page 407==

'''"Smegmo"''' 
???

'''margarine''' 
Candlebow + margarine reminds me of Camille Paglia on Renee Zellwegger as "margarine-browed" (which I don't really understand).

'''four thousand years''' 
???

'''this year''' 
???

'''flammivomous''' 
???

'''1925''' 
Lindsay c47yo?

'''Randolph''' 
(Has he been absent?)

==Page 408==

'''telegraphic messages''' 
(Why at night, particularly? Email parody?)

'''"Goes with everything"''' 
Cf Al Capp's Shmoos?

'''in the way that certain odors can instantly return us to earlier years''' 
Recalls Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu in which the taste and smell of a madeleine cookie summons a collection of childhood memories.

'''Finney Hall''' 
???

'''florescent''' 
???

==Page 409==

'''"Why you insufferable little --"''' 
This line, paired with St. Cosmo's observation at the end of the following paragraph: "And might I add, Mr. Noseworth, that these constant attempts to strangle Suckling do our public image little good," seem a fairly direct reference to a well-worn trope from the Simpsons, in which the splenetic Homer, as played here by Noseworth, expresses his no-longer-controllable frustration with Bart, here the increasingly smartalecky Suckling. Pynchon, as has been widely reported, has appeared on The Simpsons a few times.

More than even "Vineland," it seems, this book is fraught with pop culture/low comedy asides. 

'''Wellesianism''' 
Typo, unless he means Orson.

'''Asimov Transecular''' 
Interesting to find one of Isaac Asimov's time travel machines on the pile of "picked-over hulks of failed time machines." Of course, it would have to have been deposited there from some time in the future.

to transecular adj "that is made through the centuries" (Portuguese) [[User:Btchakir|Btchakir]] 16:48, 19 December 2006 (PST)

'''Q-98s''' 
FM station?

'''vulcanite''' 
???

'''Heusler's alloy''' 
???

'''bonzoline''' 
???

'''electrum''' 
???

'''lignum vitae''' 
The very hard heavy wood of any of several tropical American guaiacum trees. In Latin, literally "wood of life."

'''platinoid''' 
???

'''magnalium''' 
???

'''packfong silver''' 
???

'''safe harbor''' 
Paradoxical, I think.

'''automorphic''' 
???

==Page 410==

'''revenance''' 
???

'''Symmes Street''' 
???

'''gaslit''' 
Lightfuel motif.

'''St. Louis Fair''' 
1904.

'''fantan''' 
???

'''"preserver"''' 
Gun?

'''magenta-and-green''' 
Clashing-colors motif.

==Page 411==

'''Hawaiian''' 
???

'''Zennist''' 
Practitioners of Zen Buddhism.

'''''Caged Women of Yokohama''''' 
???

==Page 412==

'''"Does a dog possess the Buddha-nature?" [...] "Yes, obviously"''' 
According to the Zen parable the answer to the question is "Mu", which is both "No" and the sound of a dog's bark, thus neither simply yes nor no.

'''apricot and aquamarine''' 
Clashing-colors motif.

'''Bohr... Mach... Einstein... Spengler... Wells... McTaggart''' 
???

'''young Einstein''' 
Perhaps a reference to the 1988 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Einstein movie] of the same name. At the time of the F.I.C.O.T.T. (1895 at the earliest), Einstein would have already published "[http://www.worldscibooks.com/phy_etextbook/4454/4454_chap1.pdf The Investigation of the State of Aether in Magnetic Fields]." Ironically, Einstein's special theory of relativity would later essentially invalidate theories of luminiferous aether.

'''neo-Augustinian''' 
???

'''vertical distance''' 
Of pudding-drop?

'''Old Stearinery Bell Tower''' 
???

==Page 413==

'''322 feet''' 
???

'''disordered''' 
Eg clocktower assassins?

'''homeopathist''' 
???

'''"the ''lycopodium'' type"... Fear''' 
???

'''sky-brother''' 
???

'''other Promise... resurrected... two millennia''' 
???

==Page 414==

'''purlieus''' 
???

'''millwork''' 
???

'''penumbrae''' 
(Is the ligatured-ae appropriate here?)

'''interfered with''' 
Sexually molested.

'''vacant''' 
(So signs of occupancy are faked?)

'''dust''' 
(Clear sign of vacancy.)

'''systematically deluded''' 
Cf Descartes.

'''quiescence''' 
(Meatman is cyborg?)

==Page 415==

'''"Mr. Ace"''' 
Master race; ace of spades; Mr Earl?

'''phatic''' 
???

'''denounced''' 
(Capitalism has failed but failure still can't be mentioned.)

'''certain of your great dynamos''' 
???

'''Fraternity of the Venturesome''' 
Mistranslated 'Chums of Chance'.

'''''nzzt''''' 
Electrical short?

'''mission assignments''' 
Pynchon seems to explain Chums backstory.

==Page 416==

'''Squanto and the Pilgrims''' 
???

==Page 417==

'''"we're totally--"''' 
...fucked.

'''"He is not what he says he is."''' 
Pynchon denies Chums backstory/explanation.

'''trespassers''' 
???

'''enigmatic object''' 
Plotpoint?

==Page 418==

'''Trespass''' 
With a capital T.

'''evidence... everywhere''' 
Cf ''Crying of Lot 49''.

'''neuropathy''' 
An abnormal and usually degenerative state of the nervous system or nerves.

'''contracts''' 
With Devil.

'''Other Units''' 
(So our five gossiped to others?)

'''exhaustive''' 
Cf Trekkies.

'''came to recall''' 
Cf PK Dick.

'''red and indigo''' 
Clashing?

==Page 419==

'''"El Capitan"''' 
Sousa march.

'''"Whistling Rufus"''' 
???

'''consecrated''' 
???

'''Richardson Romanesque''' 
Style of American Romanesque architecture from 1880s-1890s, named after architect Henry Robson Richardson, notable for use of brown stone, rounded corners, arches and cylindrical turrets. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richardson_Romanesque Wikipedia Entry].

'''modal theory''' 
???

'''chit''' 
???

'''Bing Spooninger''' 
Like "Bing" Crosby, a crooner.

'''rack''' 
???

==Page 420==

'''every note''' 
Om?

'''say "Wall"''' 
???

'''difficult vocal feat''' 
???

'''cakewalk''' 
A black American entertainment having a cake as prize for the most accomplished steps and figures in walking; also, a stage dance developed from walking steps and figures typically involving a high prance with backward tilt. From this, slang for a one-sided contest or an easy task.

'''draw-note''' 
Note played on harmonica by "drawing" air through reed by sucking in rather than blowing out (insert sex joke here).

==Page 421==

'''popularity''' 
Masochistic love of oppressors.

'''''cover identity''''' 
Burden of resistance.

'''Lombardy poplars.''' 
???

'''Chromatic Harp''' 
A harmonica that plays all notes in an octave rather than a scale in a certain key. [http://www.hohnerusa.com/hchromatic.htm Examples].

'''Pitch Integrity Guard''' 
???

'''harmonica-reed files''' 
???

==Page 422==

'''I.G. Mundharfwerke''' 
???

'''drifted''' 
Cf Slothrop's desk.

'''Offenbach''' 
Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880), French composer of operettas.[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Offenbach Wikipedia Entry].

'''into the Latrine''' 
Cf Slothrop's hallucination.

'''vapor bearing... minerals''' 
???

'''A.D.C.''' 
???

==Page 423==

'''None of them...''' 
Cf butterfly dreaming it's monk?

'''volunteer decoys''' 
Fan-meme.

'''"At a Georgia Camp Meeting"''' 
???

'''"deps"''' 
???

'''route out of the past''' 
The nostalgia trap.

==Page 424==

''''coon' material''' 
???

'''isotropy''' 
???

'''presently''' 
R. Crumb did a comic like this.

'''opposition''' 
(Was unconscious, now conscious?)

'''dropped from altitudes''' 
(Cf pudding above)

==Page 425==

'''"After the Ball"''' 
???

'''Bukhara''' 
???

'''T.D.Y.''' 
???

'''''Saksaul''''' 
???

'''Q. Zane Toadflax''' 
(Sounds like Douglas Adams?)

'''Hypopsammotic... Hypops''' 
???

==Page 426==

'''beating their prices''' 
Contradicts p425 "no further expenditure".

==Page 427==

'''temporarily lapsing''' 
???

'''''pigs fly''''' 
Lindsay = pig.

'''legalistic''' 
???

==Annotation Index==
{{ATD PbP}}

ATD 615-643

2006-12-19T15:51:24Z

Btchakir:

==Page 626==

'''Ich Bin Ein Berliner''' 
JFK said "Ich bin ein Berliner" at the Berlin wall in 1963. According to Wikipedia, there is an urban legend: 
<blockquote>Kennedy should have said "Ich bin Berliner" to mean "I am a person from Berlin." By adding the indefinite article ein, his statement implied he was a non-human Berliner, thus "I am a jelly doughnut". The statement was followed by uproarious laughter.</blockquote> 
However, Wikipedia goes on to state: <blockquote>There is no grammatical error in Kennedy's statement; the indefinite article does not change its meaning. In German, the statement of origin "Ich bin ein Brandenburger" (I am a Brandenburger) is more common than "Ich bin Brandenburger" (I am Brandenburger), but both are correct. The article "ein" can be used as a form of emphasis: it implies "just one of many." As Kennedy did stress the "ein", the usage was, according to German linguist Jürgen Eichhoff [1], "not only correct, but the one and only correct way of expressing in German what the President intended to say."</blockquote> 
--[[User:Btchakir|Btchakir]] 07:51, 19 December 2006 (PST)

ATD 588-614

2006-12-19T15:43:38Z

Btchakir: /* Page 603 */

==Page 603==

'''''"...according to Spiral Theory, up to infinity." "And beyond, " added Gunther, nodding earnestly.''''' 
Reference to Buzz Lightyear's stock character phrase in 1995's TOY STORY (Pixar/Disney):
"To Infinity... and Beyond!"
--[[User:Btchakir|Btchakir]] 07:43, 19 December 2006 (PST)

ATD 588-614

2006-12-19T15:42:32Z

Btchakir: /* Page 603 */

ATD 588-614

2006-12-19T15:41:48Z

Btchakir: To Infinity and Beyond

==Page 603==

'''''"...according to Spiral Theory, up to infinity." "And beyond, " added Gunther, nodding earnestly.''''' 
Reference to Buzz Lightyear's character statement in 1995's TOY STORY (Pixar/Disney):
"To Infinity... and Beyond!"

User:Btchakir

2006-12-11T21:13:41Z

Btchakir:

Hi - My name is Bill Tchakirides and I've been a Pynchon reader since picking up the paperback of V in 1964 while a freshman at Northwestern.

ATD 489-524

2006-12-11T21:08:59Z

Btchakir: /* Page 513 */

==Page 494==

'''George Grossmith...and that jolly Weedon''' 

George and Weedon Grossmith, authors of the sublime, hillarious 'Diary of a Nobody', which gave the world the adjective 'pooterish'. Undoubtedly an influence on Pynchon's depictions of the 'oh dear' side of Englishness. Pooter is a 'nobody' who decides to publish his diaries, even though he is of no interest and nothing of any note occurs. A prototypical blogger, some might suggest. Originally published in Punch magazine (I think), set in late 19th Century. Don't know if the Grossmiths went to Cambridge, will check....

[plenty of info here: http://ehlt.flinders.edu.au/english/DON/Diary_Home.htm]

==Page 513==

'''1st Edition Typo''' 
"She smlld falsely"

ATD 489-524

2006-12-11T20:11:06Z

Btchakir: /* Page 494 */

ATD 397-428

2006-12-09T15:12:12Z

Btchakir: /* Page 409 */

:'''<big>Please keep these annotations SPOILER-FREE by not revealing information from later pages in the novel.</big>''' 

==Page 409==

'''Asimov Transecular''' 
Interesting to find one of Isaac Asimov's time travel machines on the pile of "picked-over hulks of failed time machines." Of course, it would have to have been deposited there from some time in the future.

to transecular adj "that is made through the centuries" (Portuguese)

User:Btchakir

2006-12-09T15:04:31Z

Btchakir: Bill Tchakirides

Hi - My name is Bill Tchakirides and I've been a Pynchon follower since picking up the paperback of V in 1964 while a freshman at Northwestern.

ATD 397-428

2006-12-09T14:59:03Z

Btchakir: /* Page 409 */

ATD 81-96

2006-12-09T04:25:26Z

Btchakir: /* Page 87 */

:'''<big>Please keep these annotations SPOILER-FREE by not revealing information from later pages in the novel.</big>''' 

==Page 81==
'''July Fourth started hot and grew hotter,...''' 

[[image:Gpynch.jpg|thumb|Guardan Review|right]] On Saturday, 18 November 2006, the UK's Guardian newspaper, in a Review section which featured a drawing of what Pynchon might now look like on its cover, published a full-page excerpt from ''Against the Day''. This comprised pages 81 to 85 (up to "he wondered sometimes if he would've ever signed on."), with the addition of the final paragraph from page 96, ending with "Happy Fourth of July, Webb." This was a much more substantial excerpt than the one which appeared in the Penguin Press catalogue, and was arguably a more alluring one in terms of attracting the general reader. These were the only official excerpts published before ATD itself, on 21 November 2006.

'''Feast of St. Barbara''' 
According to legend, Saint Barbara was the extremely beautiful daughter of a wealthy heathen named Dioscorus, who lived near Nicomedia in Asia Minor, in the 4th Century AD. Because of her singular beauty and fearful that she be demanded in marriage and taken away from him, he jealously shut her up in a tower to protect her from the outside world. When Barbara converted to Christianity, her enraged father killed her and was subsequently struck down by lightening. St. Barbara was venerated as early as the seventh century. The legend of the lightning bolt which struck down her father caused her to be regarded as the patron saint in time of danger from thunderstorms, fires and sudden death. When gunpowder made its appearance in the Western world, Saint Barbara was invoked for aid against accidents resulting from explosions since some of the earlier artillery pieces often blew up instead of firing their projectile, Saint Barbara became the patroness of the artillerymen. [http://sill-www.army.mil/pao/pabarbar.htm]

'''Propaganda of the Deed''' 
Anarchist terrorism.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_of_the_deed [Wikipedia]]

'''Zarzuela''' 
Spanish genre of musical theater. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zarzuela [Wikipedia]]

==Page 82==
'''Skinner''' 
A person who drives mules.

'''Chinaman''' 
This is the latest of many allusions to China or Chinese in an exotic, oriental way. This may simply be imitating Gilded Age and early 20th century American fiction and films, which often featured mystical Chinese as characters and villains. It also recalls the use of Feng Shui in ''Mason & Dixon''.

'''Cour d'Alene bullpens''' 
Usually 'Coeur'. Striking miners in 1892 were illegal confined in bullpens. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coeur_d'Alene_miners'_dispute [Wikipedia]]

'''Cripple Creek''' 
Cripple Creek was the location of a miner's strike in 1894. It was a significant labor event and it was the first time that a state Militia was called out in support of the miners. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cripple_Creek_miners'_strike_of_1894 Wikipedia entry]

==Page 84==

'''1900''' 
So the current Fourth of July must be 1901 or later (not 1899).

'''''Minneskort''''' 
Modern Finnish word for computer memory cards. (TRP likely saw it on a Nokia phone.)

==Page 85==
'''Innocent Victims...Monsters That Did the Deed''' 
Use of capitals seems to emphasize the fact that these persons are simply convenient stock characters in the forwarding of the owners'/government's agenda.

'''"Which left precious few targets except for the railroad."''' 
Frank Norris's 1901 novel ''The Octopus'' is summed up in one short paragraph. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Octopus_%28Frank_Norris%29 Wikipedia entry].

==Page 87==
Rev. Moss Gatlin's rhetorical question "How can anyone set off a bomb that will take innocent lives?" and its wisecrack response, "Long fuse" seems a calculated echo of Kubrick's 'Full Metal Jacket.' ("How can you shoot women and children?" "Easy -- don't lead 'em so much.")

'''Emile Henry, Vaillant''' 
Emile Henry (1872 - May 21, 1894) was a French anarchist who on February 12, 1894 detonated a bomb at the Café Terminus in the Parisian Gare Saint-Lazare killing one person and wounding twenty. Henry was angered over the execution of another Anarchist, Auguste Vaillant, for the destruction of a government building that hurt no one, and took it upon himself to strike back to avenge his fellow revolutionary's death. He saw the Cafe as a representation of the bourgeois itself and his intent was to kill as many people as possible in the bombing. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emile_Henry Wikipedia entry].

'''Mason-Dixon line''' 
We learn that the Traverse family had been "an old ridegerunning clan from southern Pennsylvania, close to the Mason-Dixon." No Traverses appear, however, in Pynchon's ''Mason & Dixon,'' but one can speculate that had they been, the Traverse ancestors may have been victims of the Line's bad Feng Shui. From this, one could infer a connection between the Line and Colorado Anarchism.

==Page 89==

'''silver-boom babies''' 
Assuming the silver boom of 1890-1892 is meant, Webb's kids were aged about 9 to 16. [[Timeline|Timeline with spoilers]]

'''Bob Ford's Funeral''' 
June 1892 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Ford_(outlaw) [Wikipedia]]

'''repeal of the Silver Act''' 

Prior to 1892, both Silver and Gold were used as a metallic standard for currency in the United States. The Sherman Act authorized the treasury to purchase 4.5 million ounces of silver per month. This inflated the price of silver, causing eastern investors to start hoarding gold as a hedge. The unrest this caused in the Colorado mines resulted in the repeal of the Act. When this happened, the mining of silver began to rapidly decline, causing further destabilization in the silver mining industry.

==Page 90==

'''before he got shot''' 
1899. [http://www.butchandsundance.com/players/ketchumgang.htm [cite]]

==Page 91==

'''"Sleep? is when you sleep...." "Only that I wouldn't want it..."''' 
(Looks like typos to me.)

==Page 93==
'''plutes''' 
Plutocrats: members of the wealthy class controlling a government

'''Labor produces all wealth. Wealth belongs to the producer thereof.''' 
Reviewers of ATD have quoted this line, [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/16/AR2006111601252.html] but Pynchon did not make it up. It comes from authentic miner's union literature of the time. [http://laborarts.org/collections/item.cfm?itemid=178]

'''Republicans''' 
William McKinley was elected in 1896 on the Republican ticket, defeating Democrat William Jennings Bryan, ushering in a chain of Republican Presidents until Woodrow Wilson was elected in 1912. Obviously, could also be interpreted as a jab at the current Republican Party.

==Page 94==

'''duster''' 
Long coat. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duster_(clothing) {Wikipedia]]

==Page 95==

'''dynamite rounders''' 
Rounders was a precursor to baseball. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rounders [Wikipedia]]

'''waiting for the rest of the joke''' 
Cf Dally and Lindsay, p27.

==Page 96==

'''"We ready?"''' 
The destruction of the railroad bridge is reminiscent of scenes in Edward Abbey's anarchistic 1975 novel ''The Monkey Wrench Gang.'' [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkey_Wrench_Gang Wikipedia entry].

'''Sufficient unto the day''' 

From The Gospel According to Saint Matthew: 6:34. "Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall
take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." (The New Testament of the King James Bible)

==Annotation Index==
{{ATD PbP}}

Tesla's Death Ray

2006-12-07T23:31:41Z

Btchakir: /* Was the Tunguska Event Caused by Tesla's Death Ray? */

== Was the Tunguska Event Caused by Tesla's Death Ray? ==

[http://www.viewzone.com/tesla.ray.html From this website.]

[[image:tesla.tower.jpg|thumb|Tesla's Wardenclyffe laboratory, where he tested his death ray.|right]]Given that Tesla's inventions generally possessed an element of social conscience, of doing good for humanity, it may seem surprising that he created a number of devices with military applications. And the notion of the Tesla harnessing his mind for purposes of war may seem immensely frightening. After all, this is the man who boasted that with his resonance generator he could split the earth in two... and no one was ever quite sure whether he was joking.

The first Tesla invention with a proposed military use was his automaton technology, with which the labor of human beings could be performed by machines. Specifically, Tesla produced remote-controlled boats and submarines. He demonstrated the wireless ship at an exposition in Madison Square Garden in 1898. The automaton apparatus was so advanced, it used a form of voice recognition to respond to the verbal commands of Tesla and volunteers from the audience.

[[image:Tesla-Tower2.jpg|thumb|Tesla's tower with dome frame, completed in 1904.|left]]In public, Tesla spoke only of the humanitarian virtues of the invention: it would lessen the toils and drudgery of mankind and keep human lives out of harm's way. But Tesla actually had his hopes on a contract with the U.S. military. In a presentation before the War Department, Tesla argued that his unmanned torpedo craft could obliterate the Spanish Armada and end the war with Spain in an afternoon. The government never took Tesla up on his offer.

Tesla then decided to pitch the automated submarine to private industry, and submitted it for the approval of J. P. Morgan. According to some accounts, Morgan offered to manufacture Tesla's vessels, but only if Tesla would agree to marry Morgan's daughter. Such a deal was of course anathema to Tesla, and he and Morgan would not work together until Wardenclyffe, a couple of years later.

Tesla eventually landed a successful military contract -- with the German Marine High Command. The product here was not unmanned sea craft, but sophisticated turbines which Admiral von Tirpitz used to great success in his fleet of warships. After J. P. Morgan cut off his support of Wardenclyffe, this foreign contract was Tesla's only substantial source of income. Upon the outbreak of World War I, Tesla chose to forfeit his German royalties, lest he be charged with treason.

Nearly broke, and finding the United States on the brink of war, Tesla dreamed up a new invention that might interest the military: the death ray.

The mechanism behind Tesla's death ray is not well understood. It was apparently some sort of particle accelerator. Tesla said it was an outgrowth of his magnifying transformer, which focused its energy output into a thin beam so concentrated it would not scatter, even over huge distances. He promoted the device as a purely defensive weapon, intended to knock down incoming attacks -- making the death ray the great-great grandfather of the Strategic Defense Initiative.

It is not certain if Tesla ever used the death ray, or indeed if he even succeeded in building one. But the following is the often-related story of what happened one night in 1908 when Tesla tested the foreboding weapon.

At the time, Robert Peary was making his second attempt to reach the North Pole. Cryptically, Tesla had notified the expedition that he would be trying to contact them somehow. They were to report to him the details of anything unusual they might witness on the open tundra. On the evening of June 30, accompanied by his associate George Scherff atop Wardenclyffe tower, Tesla aimed his death ray across the Atlantic towards the arctic, to a spot which he calculated was west of the Peary expedition.

Tesla switched on the device. At first, it was hard to tell if it was even working. Its extremity emitted a dim light that was barely visible. Then an owl flew from its perch on the tower's pinnacle, soaring into the path of the beam. The bird disintegrated instantly.

That concluded the test. Tesla watched the newspapers and sent telegrams to Peary in hopes of confirming the death ray's effectiveness. Nothing turned up. Tesla was ready to admit failure when news came of a strange event in Siberia.

On June 30, a massive explosion had devastated [[ATD-T#tunguska|'''Tunguska''']], a remote area in the Siberian wilderness. Five hundred thousand square acres of land had been instantly destroyed. Equivalent to ten to fifteen megatons of TNT, the Tunguska incident is the most powerful explosion to have occurred in human history -- not even subsequent thermonuclear detonations have surpassed it. The explosion was audible from 620 miles away. Scientists believe it was caused by either a meteorite or a fragment of a comet, although no obvious impact site or mineral remnants of such an object were ever found.

'''Nikola Tesla had a different explanation. It was plain that his death ray had overshot its intended target and destroyed Tunguska. He was thankful beyond measure that the explosion had -- miraculously -- killed no one. Tesla dismantled the death ray at once, deeming it too dangerous to remain in existence.'''

Six years later, the onset of the First World War caused Tesla to reconsider. He wrote to President Wilson, revealing his secret death ray test. He offered to rebuild the weapon for the War Department, to be used purely as a deterrent. The mere threat of such destructive force, he claimed, would cause the warring nations to agree at once to establish lasting peace.

The only response to Tesla's proposal was a form letter of appreciation from the president's secretary. The death ray was never reconstructed, and for that we should probably all be thankful.

Tesla made one further attempt to aid in his country's war effort. In 1917, he conceived of a sending station that would emit exploratory waves of energy, enabling its operators to determine the precise location of distant enemy craft. The War Department rejected Tesla's "exploring ray" as a laughing stock.

A generation later, a new invention exactly like this helped the Allies win World War II. It was called radar.

ATD 57-80

2006-12-06T06:16:36Z

Btchakir: /* Page 64 */

:'''<big>Please keep these annotations SPOILER-FREE by not revealing information from later pages in the novel.</big>''' 

==Page 58==

'''The "lumeniferous AEther"''' 
This passage recalls Pynchon's discussion of the "soniferous aether" in ''Gravity's Rainbow'' (695).

'''Michelson-Morley experiment''' 
The Michelson–Morley experiment, one of the most important and famous experiments in the history of physics, was performed in 1887 by Albert Michelson and Edward Morley at what is now Case Western Reserve University, and is generally considered to be the first strong evidence against the theory of a luminiferous aether. Primarily for this work, Albert Michelson was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1907. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson-Morley_experiment Wikipedia entry]

'''Particle or Wave? "...one finds in the devout aetherist a propensity of character evertoward the continuous as against the discrete"''' 
aether is the medium that light would move in, if it were a wave. This enters the question of whether light is a particle or a wave into the discussion. Pynchon sets up the dichotomy: (aether/wave/continuous vs. empty space/particle/discrete) (also, see page 61)

'''[[T%C3%B6pler_influence_machine|Töpler influence machine]]''' 
A machine for producing electrical charges.

==Page 59==

'''Ohio''' 
Harks back to M&D's visit with George Washington.

'''Northern Ohio Insane Asylum''' 
Full of light enthusiastes who invented light-powered bicycles (see p 76,) believe light to have consciousness and personality, and who eat light.

"Originally known as the Northern Ohio Lunatic Asylum, this was the second of 6 public asylums established in Ohio in the 1850's. In later years it was commonly known as Newburgh State Hospital because it was located in Newburgh Township as recompense for Cleveland having been awarded the location of Cuyahoga County Seat. The main building, containing 100 beds,was completed in 1855 on land in Newburgh donated by the Garfield family." [http://www.rootsweb.com/~asylums/cleveland_oh/index.html [1]]

==Page 60==

'''Aether reports''' 
Associations of light with "wind."

'''Roswell Bounce''' 
The mentions of cosmic space, balloons, a US Bureau "in charge of reporting," and his occupation as a photograper seem to allude to the 1947 Roswell UFO incident, an alleged alien crash that the US government insisted was a downed weather balloon. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_UFO_incident Wikipedia entry]

==Page 61==

'''"Somehow Merle got the idea in his head that the MIchelson-Morley experiment and the Blinky Morgan manhunt were connected."''' 
Vaguely recalls the use of John Dillinger in ''Gravity's Rainbow'' (741), insofar as they both read a surprising amount of metaphysical meaning into the death or final apprehension of a notorious criminal.
It also ties the criminal underground (out of the light) with the properties of light.

'''"Blinky" a "walking interferometer"''' 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interferometry#Interferometer Wikipedia entry on Interferometers]

'''fighting in the Rebellion''' 
The Civil War was not called such during the time it was occurring; the South called it "the war between the states" to emphasize both their right to secede from the union and that this was a war between sovereign states; the North called it "the Rebellion of 1861" or, after termination of hostilities, "the Rebellion of 1861-1865," appellations that did not recognize the South's right to secede.

==Page 62==

Blinky "emerges from invisibility" thus dooming the existance of aether. Aether is then "Against the Day" undetectable, unknowable, invisable.

==Page 63==

'''O.D. Chandrasekhar''' 
Perhaps a nod to Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1910-1995), an Indian-American physicist, astrophysicist and mathematician, known to the world as Chandra, who was awarded the 1983 Nobel Prize in Physics. He calculated and discovered the Chandrasekhar Limit which is the maximum mass possible for a white dwarf star (one of the end stages of stars that have exhausted their fuel) supported by electron degeneracy pressure, and is approximately 3 × 1030 kg, around 1.44 times the mass of the Sun.

==Page 64==

'''Photography''' 
Light tied to silver and chemistry.

==Page 67==

'''Beast Without Shame''' 
Inexplicably recalls the epithet earlier used to denounce Lew Basnight on [[ATD_26-56#Page_36|page 36]]: "the Upstate-Downstate Beast."

'''Merle and Dally''' 
Merle's family situation (single father, smart aleck daughter, mother who took off) is identical to that of ''Vineland's'' protagonist Zoyd Wheeler.

==Page 68==

'''"...have you ever felt that you wished to suddenly disappear...?''' 
While Merle is getting obsessed with revealing images from darkrooms and chemicals, Zombini comes and makes Erly "disappear."

==Page 69==

'''"some larger plan"''' 
May be talking about writing ''Against the Day'' itself.

==Page 70==

''''seng''' 
Ginseng. ''Panax sp.'' 
The [http://www.wfbf.com/media_center/photo_gallery/ginseng%20closeup.jpg "red berries"] Merle refers to. 
[http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/tending/essay1c.html American Ginseng and the Idea of the Commons] at the LOC.

==Pages 73-74==

'''Skip''' 
Obviously recalls Byron the sentient lightbulb from ''Gravity's Rainbow''.
Also recalls Insane Asylum where he is told light has "consciousness and personality."
But Merle's "hitch as a lightning-rod salesman" also may be read as Pynchon's
tip-of-the-hat (or the copper rod) to a certain nineteenth-century American
predecessor, the author of a story called "The Lightning Rod Man" (1854).
Come to think of it, Pynchon may be the one contemporary author able to match
Melville in whimsy, satire, melancholia, encryption, Jehovah-like ambition, and periodic
sentences that are light on their feet yet labyrinthine. Cf. M&D's link to Melville's
''Israel Potter'' (now, sadly, unread), or GR's line trailing back toward that book about a whale.... Cf. ATD, p. 123.
This 'Skip' episode is not to be skipped or skimmed; it sets ATD's readers briefly aglow with sweetness and light--and sadness.

==Page 76==

'''Electric Generator hooked to an old bicycle''' 
Don't know if this is that important, but similar to Insane Asylum light-bicycle.

==Page 77==

'''Webb Traverse''' 
The character is introduced mere paragraphs after the description of spiderwebs "that when the early daylight was right cause you to stand there just stupefied." As "traverse" means to travel across or through, perhaps the character's name signifies his ability to navigate the complicated webs off.. I dunno, society, the establishment or something?

In law, to "traverse" means to deny, and a "traverse" to a pleading is a denial of its allegations. This appellation fits Webb Traverse, whose anarchism is a denial of industrial capitalism.

'''Webb and Merle''' 
Photography as alchemy. Mercury and the Philosopher's stone
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_fulminate Wikipedia entry on Silver Fulminate]

==Page 78==

'''The Anti-Stone''' 
not clear what it does: turns gold into lead, i.e. explosives/weapons?

==Page 80==

'''gravity''' 
Ties into the central scientific metaphor of GR, that the laws of physics and fate are somehow connected.