Gravity's Rainbow

Slothrop continues to ride aboard the Anubis and, as they reach a harbor on the Oder River, a storm hits. The storm further delays the already late journey and turns the formerly chaotic, gleeful orgy participants into seasick stragglers, “decorated with sunbursts of vomit” (367). Slothrop searches for Bianca but cannot find her. He begins to suspect that Margherita was sent by Them, especially as she knows about the Imipolex G and the S-Gerät. In these moments, he notices how far away he seems from being able to detect the flight of rockets. He does not feel like he can return to those days. Slothrop catches sight of a person who looks like Bianca; he sees her slip and fall on the vomit-strewn deck. Before he can reach her, someone hits him hard in the kidneys and pushes him overboard.

Slothrop is pulled from the river and onto a barge belonging to a woman named Frau Gnahb and her son, Otto. She explains to Slothrop that she works in the black market and declares herself to be “queen of the coastal trade” (369). By the next morning, the storm has calmed. Slothrop leaves the barge and goes ashore to find Der Springer, whom he discovers is actually Gerhard von Göll. Together with Otto, Slothrop and Von Göll meet a rocket scientist named Klaus Närrisch. Previously, Achtfaden betrayed Närrisch to the Schwarzkommando group. Otto and Von Göll invite Slothrop to accompany them to the rocket launch site at Peenemünde. They will be traveling with a small troupe including chimpanzees, dancing girls, a great deal of alcohol, a band, and the “ulcerous impresario” G. M. B. Haftung. Slothrop agrees, though he and many members of the troupe quickly become sick onboard the boat. By the time they arrive at the ruined rocket site in Peenemünde, they are very ill. Von Göll meets a Russian friend named Major Zhdaev, though Zhdaev arrests his apparent friend. Närrisch believes that the Russian is operating on Tchitcherine’s orders. The troupe hatches a plan to save Von Göll: Someone will “pull a diversionary feint” (377) while the others grab Von Göll and run away.

Slothrop, Otto, Närrisch, and members of the “crashout party” search for the captured Von Göll among the ruins of the rocket site at Peenemünde. The dancing girls and the chimpanzees create a distraction outside a rocket assembly building, allowing Slothrop and the others to slip inside. Slothrop is becoming so focused on his immediate present, his now, that everything else seems to fade away. He has “begun to thin, to scatter” (381). When he and Närrisch meet a very tall, very strong Russian sergeant outside a pump house, they manage to disarm him and find the captured Von Göll inside. Now armed with the sergeant’s weapons, they sneak up on Zhdaev and Tchitcherine. Slothrop and Närrisch ambush the two Russians and steal their uniforms. Tchitcherine, still high on the hashish he took when he abducted Slothrop, reacts in a genial manner. Slothrop manages to talk his way out of a situation involving passing Russian soldiers. Most of the party return to the barge where Frau Gnahb is waiting for them. Närrisch does not return, and the others caution Slothrop against going back to find him, as they fear that the Russians will kill them. They expect Närrisch—once worked on the S-Gerät program in a minor capacity—to die in a spectacular final gun fight rather than be taken alive.

Enzian leads two other Herero men named Andreas and Christian in an attack on a basement in Hamburg. Their objective is to prevent the Empty Ones—a rival Herero faction unduly influenced by “the Christian missionaries” (388)—from terminating the pregnancy of Christian’s sister, Maria. When they arrive in the basement, however, the room is empty. They search for Pavel (Christian’s brother-in-law) in the bombed-out refinery because they know he has an addiction to the fumes from gasoline. While searching among the ruins, Enzian thinks about the war. He begins to see the ruined refinery not as a destroyed piece of infrastructure. He sees it as being “in perfect working order” (389); both sides of the war have worked together to bomb around the facility and leave the infrastructure intact, as part of some grand conspiracy. His thoughts are influenced by the “Nazi surplus” amphetamines that he takes. When they finally find Pavel huffing gasoline fumes, he is caught in a vivid hallucination. Christian wants to shoot Pavel for failing to protect Maria, but Enzian intervenes. He decides that the new mission for himself and the Zone-Hereros should be to figure out the meaning of the refinery that is named after Laszlo Jamf. He believes that the building can be understood like a “True Text.” He decides that they may need more help. Christian accuses Enzian of not caring about his sister or the Hereros, of not caring any more. Enzian, recognizing some truth in Christian’s accusations, allows Christian to punch him in the face.

Slothrop is on Frau Gnahb’s barge. Von Göll assigns him a mission, telling him to return to the Anubis and retrieve the hashish. Slothrop, still bitter that the group abandoned Närrisch, agrees to the mission on the condition that Von Göll provide him with military discharge papers. The mission begins with Frau Gnahb ramming the Anubis with her barge. Slothrop, Von Göll, and Otto swing across onto the deck of the boat as though they were pirates. Slothrop goes searching for the hashish in the engine room, but someone turns off the lights. The unseen person attacks Slothrop in the dark and tells him to continue down into the engine room. Slothrop finds where the drugs are stashed, but he is horrified by the sight of Bianca’s dead body, “dancing dead-white and scarlet at the edges of his sight” (399). Back on the barge, Slothrop cannot celebrate with the others. When they reach the port in Stralsund, he leaves the group behind and decides to continue his journey on land.

Brigadier Ernest Pudding dies of “a massive E. coli infection” (400). After his death, Katje stays at the White Visitation a while and watches the film reels, made by Osbie Feel without her knowledge. Other reels show Grigori the octopus being made to watch these films while being trained to attack Katje. The final reel seems to be made especially for Katje, in which Osbie speaks to her in “a message, in code” (401). Katje tracks down Osbie and finds him preparing for some mission to Germany alongside Pirate. Katje decides to join them.

After agreeing to join up with Pirate, Katje finds herself in a “disquieting structure” that seems to be made of melted candy. Pirate and Katje talk about the surreal surroundings and decide that they are in a kind of afterlife for double agents. Pirate is overcome with emotion, realizing that he may “die in obscurity, without having helped a soul: without love” (408), alone. Katje and Pirate talk about Them, sex, love, and the way in which the world perceives people like them. They remember their sexual experiences and realize that they are all a part of “a megalomaniac master plan of sexual love” (411), which is the true meaning of loving the People, even though the People will never love them. They dance together.

Slothrop journeys across the Zone dressed in Tchitcherine’s Russian uniform, though he has ripped off the military insignia to avoid unwanted attention. He walks alongside the refugees and people displaced by the war, who move in “a great frontierless streaming” (412). Though the people seem welcoming and willing to share what little food they have, Slothrop cannot stay around them too long as they seem too intense to him. He reaches a farmhouse and falls asleep. While asleep, he “dreams about Tantivy Mucker-Maffick, his friend from long ago” (413) who now seems unreachable in the underworld. Slothrop continues his journey through a forest. He realizes his family made money from paper manufacturing, so he apologizes to the trees for killing them, explaining there is “insanity in my family” (414). One of the trees responds, telling Slothrop to halt the work of a nearby logging firm to make up for his family’s behavior. Slothrop meets a German boy named Ludwig who is searching for a lost lemming named Ursula. Slothrop cannot understand why Ludwig—who “may not be completely Right in the Head” (415)—would want a pet that is well known to jump off cliffs, especially as lemmings typically live in huge groups. When Slothrop hears “the ghost of Slothrop’s first American ancestor William” (416) calling to him from beyond the grave, he listens. William compares Jesus Christ walking on water to swarms of lemmings that jump off cliffs and die. Jesus’s miracle, William says, was only meaningful because, “without the millions who had plunged and drowned, there could have been no miracle” (416). William Slothrop was an American pioneer and a pig farmer, though he felt bad when the pigs were slaughtered. His relationship with his pigs caused him to have a crisis of faith, and he wrote a book about religion titled On Preterition. The book focused on the people who were seemingly either ignored or not chosen by God. Judas Iscariot was a savior to these people, William believed. His ideas could potentially have created an alternative future for America. Back in the present, Slothrop is unsure whether he is in control of his fate. His actions and decisions may be the result of manipulation. Ludwig and Slothrop see a passing girl wearing a fur coat. After Ludwig accuses her of killing his lemming, they follow her into a church basement and, in the basement, they find Major Marvy.

Major Marvy does not recognize Slothrop. Believing Slothrop to be a Russian soldier, he offers him “some o’ Duance Marvy’s Atomic Chili” (418) and complains about the raid on Peenemünde. Among his black-market schemes, Marvy is selling fur coats and believes that there is “a great future in these V-weapons” (419). Together with his friend Clayton Chiclitz, Marvy takes Slothrop to view a rocket battery. On the way, Slothrop spots the “Schwarzkommando mandala: KEZVH” (420), which is made from the launching sequence for V2 rockets. Marvy explains that the Russians will attack the Schwarzkommando group at midnight. The lack of insignia on Slothrop’s uniform leads him to believe that Slothrop works for Soviet counterintelligence. Playing along, Slothrop asks for more information about the Schwarzkommando, and Marvy tells Slothrop where to find the group. As Marvy gives him a ride back into the town, Slothrop thinks about how he will get revenge against Marvy. Afterward, he searches for the Schwarzkommando. He realizes that he has not thought about “Imipolex G, all that Jamf a-and that S-Gerät” (421) for some time. As he thinks, he is ambushed by the Schwarzkommando, led by Andreas Orukambe while Enzian is away. Slothrop tells Andreas about the imminent attack, and, while the Schwarzkommando eat dinner, they debate their next move. Slothrop reveals everything he has learned while Andreas explains the significance of the KEZVH symbol: The five stages represent birth, soul, fire, building, and the pen where the Herero keep “the sacred cattle” (422). Slothrop hopes that the belief will protect the Schwarzkommando from Marvy and Tchitcherine.

Närrisch expected to die in a gunfight but was captured and questioned by Tchitcherine, who now possesses important information about the 00000 rocket, which was fired by Blicero (the head of the S-Gerät project) at Nordhausen. He has learned that the rocket has a radio that transmits to the rocket from the launch site, but the rocket can only send, not receive, these radio signals. With Marvy and Chiclitz, Tchitcherine attacks the Schwarzkommando. However, the Herero troops have already departed. Tchitcherine blames Marvy for talking to the mysterious man in the Soviet uniform. He ponders the man’s identity, unaware the man was Slothrop. Marvy complains that large oil corporations are pressuring him to obtain the rocket technology, as they do not have “General Electric breathin’ over your shoulder” (423). Marvy and Chiclitz discuss their paranoid, antisemitic theories about these corporations while Tchitcherine plots his next move. He has a vision of a large white finger in the sky that points to “a Rocket cartel” (424), which will control the rocket technology more than any single agency. He imagines forming a new kind of state that will “take form in the stateless German night” (424), similar to the Catholic Church, which spreads across borders thanks to its control of the rocket technology. To Tchitcherine, everyone already seems to belong to this formless state except for himself and Enzian, his half-brother. Tchitcherine worries what will happen if “They find out [that he is] not what They think” (425).

Slothrop hopes he will receive his discharge papers in the town of Cuxhaven. He thinks about the repeating shapes in his life, such as “the stairstep gables” (425) found on the façade of most local German houses; the shape of the stairs resembles the flight of a cannonball. Slothrop arrives in a coastal town. As he sleeps at night, children gather around him and tell a story about the Pig-Hero, Plechazunga, who fights Viking raiders to save his village. Each year, the village celebrates his victory—but, this year, they need someone to dress up and play the Pig-Hero role. Slothrop agrees to become the Pig-Hero, donning the “startling,” colorful pig costume. The festival involves fireworks and celebrations. Afterward, people huddle in little groups and barter black-market goods. When the police arrive, they break up the trading with a gleeful “nostalgia for the old days” (427). The police bring Russian reinforcements, and an increasingly nervous Slothrop is told there is a warrant for his arrest; the Russians believe that his discarded uniform shows he is a deserter.

Fleeing town before the police catch him, Slothrop continues his journey, still dressed as the Pig-Hero. At one point, he is joined by a female pig who walks at his side and “seems to know where she’s going” (431). Eventually, Slothrop and the pig arrive at the children’s resort where Franz Pökler met Isle each year; Pökler is at the resort. He greets Slothrop and thanks him for returning Freida, his pet pig. As they play chess, Slothrop recognizes Pökler’s name; Pökler, nervous, draws a pistol and threatens to kill Slothrop, who must explain how the Russians, Americans, and Hereros are all searching for rocket technology and the S-Gerät. Pökler understands. He knows about Imipolex G, but, before he reveals anything to Slothrop, he reminisces to Slothrop about past visits to the resort with Ilse. Slothrop has a horrible memory of Bianca; he wonders whether Bianca and Ilse are “the same child” (434), as the Alpdrücken film played a pivotal role in both being conceived.

Later that evening, Pökler tells Slothrop about Laszlo Jamf. When he worked as a chemistry professor, Jamf believed that science needed to reach beyond the confines of organic chemistry, toward “the inorganic.” Jamf never conducted any research into inorganic chemistry, instead focusing only on carbon and hydrogen and the covalent bond between the two elements. Jamf went to the United States, where he fell “under the sinister influence” (436) of Slothrop’s uncle, Lyle Bland.

Lyle Bland was a very wealthy man who lived in Boston. Together with his brother Broderick (Slothrop’s father), Lyle agreed to allow Jamf to experiment on the infant Slothrop as psychological studies were a “Bland specialty.” Lyle was also associated with the Freemasons and, throughout his career, often dabbled in conspiracies, such as the suggestion that he held patents for certain technologies but suppressed them to ensure his companies’ continued profits. Lyle Bland inhabits the center of the tangled web of many of the novel’s conspiracies, such as his association with Jamf. His Freemason involvement also creates a tangential association with many other conspiracy theories, such as the idea that the United States itself is a “gigantic Masonic plot under the ultimate control of the group known as the Illuminati” (442). By the time Lyle joined the Freemasons, however, their influence had declined to the point where they were only a club for businessmen. Nevertheless, Lyle appreciated the supernatural nature of the “very, very old” (442) Masonic rituals. One night after a Freemasons meeting, he had an out of body experience that “changed [him] forever” (443). Eventually, he learned how to control such experiences. He delved deeper and deeper into mysticism and met many strange people. One night, he gathered his family together and told them that he was “going out for good” (444). He laid down and never got up again.

Cuxhaven was the launch site for many Nazi V2 rockets. Working on Pointsman’s orders, Doctors Muffage and Spontoon search for Slothrop in Cuxhaven. They hear about “the Yank in the pig suit” (446) and wonder whether Pointsman’s sense of reality is faltering. Slothrop is also in Cuxhaven, where black-market trading takes place at a large party involving the dancing girls and seaman Bodine, who is dealing and taking drugs while organizing “the First International Runcible Spoon Fight” (447). Still dressed in the pig costume, Slothrop tells a drug dealer named Albert Krypton that he is the Rocketman who recovered the hashish; Krypton helps Slothrop escape the attention of some soldiers who want to arrest him. Fearing he has been “double-crossed,” Slothrop, Krypton, and Bodine leave Cuxhaven; Slothrop suggests they visit a brothel outside the town named Putzi’s, famous for entertaining “soldiers, sailors, dames, tricks, winners, losers, conjurors, dealers, dopers, voyeurs, homosexuals, fetishists, spies and folks just looking for company” (453). Slothrop wants to find Von Göll (referring to him as Der Springer). Instead, he allows a sex worker named Solange to take him “down to the baths” (453) where she removes his pig suit. Bodine meets Major Marvy at the brothel, intending to sell him cocaine. The police raid the brothel and Marvy desperately searches for his uniform; instead, he grabs Slothrop’s pig costume, believing that the military police would not “bother an innocent funseeking pig” (456). Pointsman’s men tell the police that the man they are searching for is dressed in a pig costume; the police arrest Marvy and place him in an ambulance, where Pointsman’s men perform a surgical castration that was intended for Slothrop. They keep Marvy’s testicles as “souvenirs for Pointsman” (458). At the brothel, Slothrop sleeps next to Solange—whom he does not know is Leni Pökler. Slothrop dreams about Bianca while Leni dreams about Ilse, both of whom still may be the same child. Bodine fails to acquire Slothrop’s discharge papers as Von Göll is too busy to help.

Tchitcherine arrives at the rocket launch site near Lüneberg Heath where Blicero (also known as Weissmann) was in charge “and fired the 00000 somewhere close by” (459). He wonders whether he will survive the imminent showdown. In the distance, Von Göll films the Martin Fierro biopic for the anarchists from Argentina. Tchitcherine decides to proceed with caution. He has already lost Major Marvy and suspects Marvy may have been abducted by a “counterforce in the Zone” (459). He still ponders the identity of the mysterious Russian counterintelligence officer and suspects that a Rocket cartel may be behind Marvy’s disappearance. He remembers meeting a Soviet Union man in Berlin who described Tchitcherine as “useful” (which felt like a death sentence) and said Tchitcherine was attracting attention because he was never supposed to survive the war.

Tchitcherine watches the film shoot again. Surveying the film sets, he wonders whether anyone will ever inhabit the prop houses. The Zone is home to many strange communities, such as one town that has been “taken over by army dogs, Dobermans and Shepherds, each one conditioned to kill on sight any human” (461). The dogs are unaware they were trained—by Pointsman, in fact—to attack in this manner. Pointsman has been ordered to study the community of dogs (he is “officially in disgrace” (462) since the mistaken castration of Major Marvy). The researcher’s fate is now a hot topic at the White Visitation, as is Slothrop. Clive Mossman discusses the issues with Sir Marcus Scammony, his colleague. They complain that Slothrop has failed in his mission to “destroy the blacks” (463). Scammony believes Slothrop poses no threat, and he speculates Slothrop may even have fled Germany. The Americans, he says, have also formulated plans to target minority groups. Scammony and Mossman are lovers, a type of relationship that has become increasingly common in the British Army since World War I. Sexual relationships between men are so common now that they are a part of military bureaucracy, so much so that most sex now only occurs “on paper” (464).