Friday, January 26, 2007

Oh Thurn and Taxis

Eclectic annotations on Pynchon's Against the Day.

A Pynchonian grace note passes between Webb Traverse and blasting buddy Veikko, the mad Finn. Webb notices Veikko “reading over and over to himself a withered postcard from Finland” (p.84)

“Look, these aren’t real stamps here,” Veikko said.” “They are pictures of stamps. The Russians no longer allow Finnish stamps, we have to use Russian ones. These postmarks? They’re not real either. Pictures of postmarks. …

“So this is a postcard with a picture of what a postcard used to look like before the Russians. That’s what minneskort means?”

“Memory card. A memory of a memory.”

See the Thurn und Taxis page from San Narcisco Community College, inspired by The Crying of Lot 49.

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