I just finished reading the book. I was wondering if anybody knows why Barney Mayerson was called "impure" (it might be a different word in the original, I read a translation).
Well, at least he wasn't eaten, but it didn't really make sense for me, because the animal also said that not every human is like that. But if it has to do with Palmer Eldritch/consumption of Chew-Z, then pretty much everybody on Mars would be impure at that point, right?
Well, that would explain why he was starving, it's just that being impure sounded like a special thing.
Maybe that's Mayerson still feeling guilty and projecting this feeling into the hallucination?
Did I miss something obvious?
I would love to hear some opinions.
Can someone help me with the meaning of "Flax Back Spit"? I have checked some translations of the novel and in every one I saw they just left it in English with no explanation, even when they translated the name of the main hovel, "Chicken Pox Prospects".
I suppose the name means something ironic/sad/funny, like the main one, but I cannot find a logical meaning for that particular string of words.
Iโm not even sure about the sense of โspitโ here (a small tongue of land projecting into the water? a layer of earth of a spade's depth? spittle? skewer?).
Is โflaxโ here the plant, linen, a color (โflaxenโ), something old-timey and slangy (โflaxationโ)?
Is it more Flax-Back Spit? Or Flax Back-Spit? Neither is very clear to me.
The context from the novel does not help much:
> Anne said suddenly, "I have some Can-D, Barney." She reached into the pockets of her UN-issue canvas work-slacks, groped, and brought a small packet out. "I bought it a little while ago, in my own hovel. Flax Back Spit, as they call it.
>
>...
>
> "I have to get back to Flax Back Spit," she explained.
>
>...
>
> Because ahead of them lay the hovel Flax Back Spit; its entrance light glowed dimly in the Martian gloom.
Heโs now high on the list of people I never want to see again.
Heโs a pickup artist.
Dark, isnโt it?
Yep. It's our bison-tennial.
It sucks
She did not hold Up well.
[depleted]
Pupils. They dilate.
Man: Canโt say that I do.
Therapist: Exactly. Thatโs the main one.
Too many handshakes
"This is a stick up!"
He'll stop at nothing to avoid them
Larry Tesler, the inventor of copy and paste died today. Larry Tesler, the inventor of copy and paste died today. Larry Tesler, the inventor of copy and paste died today. Larry Tesler, the inventor of copy and paste died today.
In other words, there is joint support for joint support for joint support...
