Forum / Pynchon's "V." on abortion (1963, NYC characters):

• 
  Smiley McGrouchpants, Jr-Esq-III

  Jun 24, 08:58pm

  We're gonna party like it's 1963 (N.Y.C.), or ... Here We GO *AGAIN*:
  ----------------------------------------------
  "For all his Fascist tendencies, Battista has one golden virtue: abortion he maintains is legal. Which means you get an M.D. who knows what he's about, not some fumbling amateur. It's clean, it's safe, it's legal, above all, it's cheap."
  "It's murder."
  "You've turned R.C. [Roman CATHLOLIC] Good show. For some reason it always becomes fashionable during a Decadence."
  "You know what I am," she whispered.
  "We'll leave that go. I wish I did." He stopped a minute because he felt himself going sentimental. He finagled around with figures on a scrap of vellum. "For 300," he said," we can get you there and back. Including meals if you feel like eating."
  "We."
  "The Whole Sick Crew. You can do it inside a week, down to Havana and back. You'll be yo-yo champion."
  "No."
  So they talked metaphysics while the afternoon waned. Neither felt he was defending or trying to prove anything important. It was like playing one-up at a party, or Botticelli. They quoted to each other from Liguorian tracts, Galen, Aristotle, David Riesman, T.S. Eliot.
  "How can you say there's a soul there. How can you tell when the soul enters the flesh. Or whether you even have a soul?"
  "It's murdering your own child, is what it is."
  "Child, schmild. A complex protein molecule, is all."

  https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060930217/ref=cm_sw_s_fa_dp_AMX1KA1MABJKFFA0HRJM#_=_

• You must log in to reply to this thread.