ATD 429-459

2007-01-02T00:55:59Z

Rmutt: /* Page 436 */

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

==Page 431==

'''"Turkish Corner"''' 
???

'''Bactrian''' 
''Camel''. Even-toed ungulate, two-humped (twin-peaked) as compared with the one-humped dromedary.

'''Cameling''' 
???

'''''secret determinant of history''''' 

==Page 432==

'''fatal word''' 
"Wife".

'''Gamomania''' 
"Gamos" is greek for "marriage," and mania means "mania" or "madness."

'''H.M.S.F.''' 
His Majesty's Subdesertine Frigate (p425).

'''Balaam's ass''' 
refers to Num. 22:21-34 - Balaam rides out with the princes of Moab, but the Lord sends an angel to prevent him. Balaam does not see the angel but his ass does and will not go further. Balaam smites the ass three times, to no avail, until "the Lord opened the mouth of the ass, and she said to Balaam: What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times?" Balaam's ass and the serpent (in the Garden of Eden) are the only speaking animals in the bible.

'''reported... Polo''' 
???

==Page 433==

'''pan-spectral fields''' 
???

'''"Euphrates" poplars''' 
???

'''aryq''' 
???

'''B.I.N.''' 
Biometric Institute of Neuropathy (p432).

'''seventeen-syllable''' 
Haiku - japanese poems consisting of 17 syllables, classically arranged in three lines of 5 - 7 - 5 syllables each

==Page 434==

'''Eta/Nu Transformators''' 
???

'''pari passu''' 
on an equal footing

==Page 435==

'''Gurkhas''' 
Nepalese forces that have fought alongside British troops.

'''General Forrest''' 
???

'''archiepiscopal''' 
???

'''Faberge''' 
Russian jewelers. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Faberg%C3%A9 Wikipedia entry].

'''subarenaceous''' 
Below or beneath the sand (sub) + (arenaceous).

==Page 436==

'''limen''' 
threshold

'''transmundane''' 
literally: beyond the mundane, beyond the world

'''lamaseries''' 
???

'''Torriform''' 
???

'''Urban terrain''' 
(But only cities unwisely built on sand.)

'''Stilton Gaspereaux''' 
???

'''Sven Hedin''' 
???

'''Aurel Stein''' 
Sir Marc Aurel Stein. Hungarian-born explorer later knighted as a British citizen. Credited with the discovery, and arguably the exploitation, of the Mogao Grottoes in China. A rock-carved repository of ancient Buddhist texts and murals, the grottoes are known collectively as 'The Cave of a Thousand Buddhas' and protected a copy of the Mahayana Diamond sutra, acknowledged as the oldest book in existence. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Aurel_Stein Wikipedia entry].

'''first known maps''' 
???

==Page 437==

'''Nernst lamps''' 
???

'''level of encryption''' 
(Cf Heisenberg?)

'''Mount Kailash''' 
???

'''polarize... in time''' 
???

'''Manichaeans''' 
A gnostic sect that followed the third century Persian prophet Mani.

==Page 438==

'''expanded sense... Maxwell... Hertz''' 
???

''''Perfects'''' 
Perfects are the priests of the Cathar, a pantheistic manicheistic sect from the middle ages.

'''Graeco-Buddhist''' 
???

'''Italo-Islamic''' 
???

==Page 439==

'''Nuovo Rialto''' 
???

'''no earlier than''' 
(Where'd they go?)

'''Passing of the Remarks''' 
???

'''Steeplechase Park''' 
???

==Page 440==

'''screaming''' 
Screaming motif.

'''''chong pir''''' 
???

'''Uyghur''' 
???

'''skeleton rig''' 
Concealed weapon?

'''andante''' 
???

'''Sandman Saloon''' 
???

==Page 441==

'''Leonard and Lyle''' 
???

'''''teke''''' 
???

'''Spindletop''' 
???

'''Groznyi''' 
???

'''calyx bits''' 
???

'''adults''' 
Chums not adults, then?

'''''assalamu alaykum''''' 
A muslim greeting.

'''anticline''' 
???

==Page 442==

'''''equine altitude''''' 
High horse.

'''Veneto-Uyghur''' 
???

'''2 percent... most of them''' 
Implies at least 150 in crew.

'''Marco Querini''' 
???

'''Terrenascondite''' 
???

'''Pozzo San Vito''' 
???

==Page 443==

'''peterman option''' 
A 'peterman' is a slang term for a safe-blower.

'''Consomme Imperial''' 
???

'''Timbales de Supremes de Volailles''' 
???

'''Gigot Grille a la Sauce Piquante''' 
A 'gigot' is a leg of lamb or haunch of veal. 'Sauce Piquante' is a spicy sauce.

'''aubergines a la Sauce Mousseline''' 
Eggplants with mussel sauce.

'''Pouilly-Fuisse''' 
A white Burgundy made from the Chardonnay grape.

'''Graves''' 
A white wine from the Graves district of France.

==Page 444==

'''Oasi''' 
Plural of "oasis."

'''cataplexy''' 
Sudden loss of muscle power following a strong emotional stimulus.

'''Nobel brothers''' 
Robert and Ludvig Nobel, brothers of Alfred Nobel of dynamite and prize fame, co-founders of Branobel, an important early oil company that controlled a large amount of Russian output. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branobel Wikipedia entry].

'''shaft-alley''' 
???

'''the balloon is up''' 
A phrase also used in ''V.''

'''F.O.''' 
Foreign Office

'''''Daily Mail''''' 
London tabloid, staunch early supporters of Alolf HItler. Today specialises in stirring up hatred of immigrants and other minorities.

'''"Sands of Inner Asia"''' 
???

'''Taklamakan''' 
???

==Page 445==

'''Kashgar to Urumchi''' 
???

'''fell into the hand of''' 
Cf modern Taliban, etc.

'''World-Island''' 
???

'''discreet summons''' 
Eg "paging Dr Blue".
It doesn't seem to me to be a phrase that needs a gloss: a discreet summons is simply what it says and made be made in any number of ways.

'''far wicket''' 
A 'wicket' may simply be a gate; but in the context of a novel and the bomber at Headingley cricket ground and Fenners, the Cambrdige cricket ground, a 'wicket' is the three stumps at one end of a cricket pitch.

'''wog''' 
''Chiefly British.'' An ethnic slur used for any dark-skinned peoples. Alleged to stand for "Western Oriental Gentleman", but mainly applied to Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, and other brown-skinned Asians.
I have heard it comes from 'wily oriental gentleman'; but the Oxford English Dictionary states that the origin is uncertain and defines a 'wog' as someone especially of Arab extraction.

'''Vic removal''' 
???

'''eating an explosive''' 
Cf Lew's Cyclomite.

==Page 446==

'''St Martin le Grand''' 
A street in the City of London.

'''Angel Street''' 
Another street in the City which meets St Martin le Grand at right-angles.

'''G.P.O. West''' 
G.P.O - General Post Office

'''pneumatic dispatches''' 
An extensive 'pneumatic dispatch' system existed on London during the Victorian era, started in 1851 and carrying on at least into the 1930's. By 1886 London had 94 telegram tubes totaling 34 1/2 miles and around 4.5 million telegraph messages were carried in cylinders at around 20mph. At its height the network extended some 57 miles connecting 67 branch offices via a central sorting office. See [http://www.capsu.org/history/telegram_conveyors.html] and
[http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/COMMS/pneumess/pneumess.htm] (with illustrations).

'''drill suits''' 
???

'''chars''' 
Charwomen. Maids, cleaners.

'''clicks and rests''' 
Presumably the clicks of a telegraphic system and the rests or silences in between.

'''Northern Temple of Connexion''' 
It's in the north of the City; and the phrase suggests the religious intensity of the need to connect or communicate as well as mildly satirising it.

'''marblework''' 
Such buildings would have used quantities of marble; hence the image of a 'temple' above.

'''Bloggins''' 
An archetypal ordinary man; an everyman figure.

'''allegro vivatchy''' 
phonetic of 'allegro vivace' - a musical term for a quick tempo

==Page 447==

'''grease-paint''' 
'Grease-paint' refers to old-fashioned stage make-up.

'''cylinder of gutta-percha''' 
Pneumatic dispatches were carried in cylinders of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gutta-percha Gutta-Percha] -- an inelastic latex made from the sap of the Gutta-Percha tree -- covered in felt. See [http://www.capsu.org/history/telegram_conveyors.html]. Gutta-percha crops up a number of times in ATD, possibly enough to suggest some sort of motif or connection?

Gutta percha per se is a Victorian equivalent to rubber.

'''its "D" box''' 
The receiving mechanism on the end of pneumatic dispatch pipe.

"The somewhat complicated pattern of double sluice valve originally used at the central stations has been superseded by a simpler form, known as the D box, so named Despatching from the shape of its cross section. This box is of and cast iron, and is provided with a close-fitting, Receiving brass-framed, sliding lid with a glass panel. This Apparatus, lid fits air-tight, and closes the box after a carrier has been inserted into the mouth of the tube; the latter enters at one end of the box and is there bell-mouthed. A supply pipe, to which is connected a 3-way cock, is joined on to the box and allows communication at will with either the pressure or vacuum mains, so that the apparatus becomes available for either sending (by pressure) or receiving (by vacuum) a carrier. Automatic working, by which the air supply is automatically turned on on the introduction of the carrier into a tube and on closing of the D box, and is cut off when the carrier arrives, was introduced in 1909." From the 1911 Encyclopedia Brittanica entry on Pneumatic Dispatch, cited at [http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/COMMS/pneumess/pneumess.htm]

'''Holborn''' 
Holborn is between the Strand (at the northern end of Waterloo Bridge) and Bloomsbury.

'''Saffron Hill''' 
is in the City, an area named Farringdon, east of Holborn.

'''''tantum dic verbo'' isn't it''' 
???

'''''intact''''' 
(Did I miss this?)

==Page 448==

'''because I'm mad''' 
???

'''half-sovereign case''' 
A sovereign is old English money for one pound, i.e 20 shillings. A half-sovereign is ten shillings old money.

'''Mr. Campbell-Bannerman''' 
Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman (1836-1908) was a Liberal MP and then Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1905 to 1908. I'm not sure when he was knighted; but he's not the only character in the novel connected with Trinity College, Cambridge.

==Page 449==

'''Clarabella''' 
???

'''Audacity, Iowa''' 
???

==Page 450==

'''DREAMTIME MOVY''' 
Misspelling is dreamlike? Or, more possibly, the spelling hadn't yet been standardized.

'''log... waterfall''' 
Cf DW Griffith?

'''lens-brother''' 
(Like masonic sign?)(Also reminiscent of the lens (the K/kid/d) carries in Delaney's ''Dhalgren'')

'''Powers movement''' 
???

'''Geneva''' 
???

'''Wilt Flambo''' 
Flambeau = torch (French).

'''acetylene''' 
???

==Page 451==

'''nitro in the film''' 
Cellulose nitrate, also known as collodion, was the predecessor to modern photographic films. The collodion was the substratum to the chemistry that made the image.

'''the tip''' 
???

'''strange relation''' 
Cf GR on calculus.

'''dark perplexity''' 
Cf Gen X?

'''dilapidated''' 
Why?

'''queen-of-the-prairie''' 
???

==Page 452==

'''Sempitern''' 
An archaic term meaning 'eternal', a poetic but appropriate name for a river?

'''siegecraft of Time''' 
Cf Paris Commune siege, above.

'''between Cleveland and Denver''' 
Merle's idiosyncratic choice of endpoints?

'''automorphic functions''' 
???

==Page 453==

'''Lobatchevskian''' 
of Nikolai Lobachevsky, a Russian Mathematician, known for work into non-Euclidean geometry.

'''Automorphic Dispensation''' 
???

'''distressing regularity''' 
Explains dilapidation?

'''Thorvald''' 
???

'''''thresher dinners''''' 
???

==Page 454==

'''"gaff"''' 
???

'''Giant Airships of 1896 and '7''' 
[http://against-the-day.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Image:Mysterious-airship.jpg Photo and info here]

'''Chick''' 
First Chum to appear in non-Chums chapter?

'''Cleveland... trial''' 
See p67

'''Somble, Strool, and Fleshway''' 
???

''''paranoia querulans'... P.Q.''' 
???

'''blasting agent''' 
???

'''detonans''' 
That which is detonated - cod latin

==Page 456==

'''aigrette''' 
Literally an egret or aigrette (or Lesser White Heron); hence a tuft of feathers such as an egret has and hence a spray of gems worn on the head and finally luminous rays seen emerging from the moon in solar eclipses or, to quote the OED, "at the ends of electrified bodies".

'''Pencil''' 
Certainly a reference to the theme of communication...

'''equivalent of a shrug''' 
Nice anthropomorphism.

'''lost mines''' 
(Factual?)

==Page 457==

'''tourbillon''' 
???

'''patent pencils''' 
???

'''zephyr gingham''' 
???

'''lawn''' 
???

'''pongee''' 
???

==Page 458==

'''professors... engineers''' 
Theory vs practice.

'''Latinate token of prestige''' 
PhD, summa cum laude, etc.

'''current... purity''' 
Free of noise?

'''Minkowski''' 
???

'''Three times ten... minus one seconds''' 
???

'''other expression''' 
???

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

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ATD 429-459