Dear Cyndy,

In the absence of a reply from you, - and I'm not complaining, -
I've been rereading my recent letters. It's without irony that I
thank you again for your having taken the trouble to read Chapter 52,
and for your criticism of the entanglement with words which it
demonstrates. This morning, as I think about it, I ask myself, 
shouldn't "Die Freunde" be a novel also about word addiction.
There are novels enough about alcohol addiction and drug addiction.
Arguably for the individual afflicted, the debility is comparable,
if not worse. The alcoholic can find company in the saloon or in
the bar, but poor rich Katenus literally has no place to assuage
the loneliness of his addiction, has no one, except Mengs and
Joachim who will listen to him and take him seriously.

As I contemplate the continuation of the novel, I see that Mengs
will be infected by Katenus' bad habits of excessive(ly) verbal
thought. Joachim will be saved by Charlotte from a similar fate.
Katenus and Mengs will be ruined by the need to meditate and by
the compulsion to try to communicate their intellectual "visions".
The need to feel, to think, and above all, to talk, will be their
undoing.  My novel has no surrogate for the divine such as Father
Sosima, and thus I have no one to bow deeply, to touch his forehead
to the ground before Katenus and Mengs in anticipation of their 
demise.
 
As I suggested in a recent letter, I'm reluctant to accompany
Charlotte to cooking school; and I think I've solved my problem
by having her quit prematurely for reasons I haven't yet determined.
As a cause, I could cook up an embarrassing altercation or some
semi-shameful indiscretion on her part; or I could just have her
quit from boredom, or in consequence of the distraction of some 
other interest. I intend to show her an Internet URL:
http://www.airbnb.com/info/how_it_works which will inspire her
with the ambition to become the hostess of an International Bed
and Breakfast establishment in Jonathan's house, - of course without
the advice and consent of anyone including Jonathan, the nominal
owner, an arrangement calculated by her (and by me) to introduce
a variety of strangers into the novel, with personalities
ranging from saints to devils. Charlotte will appear more and more
as the secular antithesis to Katenus, wordly, seductive, promiscuous,
insensitive, thoughtless, exploitative, in contrast to Katenuses
pensive, meditative, unassuming affection (agape). Charlotte's
influence on Joachim will rupture his friendship with Mengs. Charlotte
will then plot to have Mengs ejected from his professorship and plot
successfully to have him replaced with Joachim.  She will make Iago
look like Father Sosima.  

Because my right hip especially is resentful of long hours
sitting at the computer keyboard, I gave it a vacation and spent
yesterday creating a semblance of order in the west wing of
the third floor addition, where bank and brokerage statements
had started to clutter the tables, and in the basement which
is forever in need of clean-up. There I found an Acoustic Research
phonograph turntable which Klemens had discarded, and although I
have one such unit which functions, I found it a challenge to try
to rehabilitate this one also. It turned out that the lubricant
for the turntable spindle had congealed into a glue which
initially prevented all rotation, and then caused restriction of
in the face of which the small synchronous motor was helpless.
It required more than an hour of cleaning and polishing before
the turntable spun freely enough for the motor to be able to do
its work. Now it turns out that the tone-arm also is broken and
one or more of the delicate wires to the cartridge that transforms
the needle-vibrations into electical impulses has been ruptured.
Whether I'll be able to repair this remains to be seen. At this
juncture, I'm not sure I will even try.

Margaret and I are making tentative plans to leave for Konnarock
on Monday April 16, provided Judge Macdonald does not hand down any 
decisions that require my continuing presence in the Boston area.
I tell myself that I must remain flexible and proceed as way opens.
Jochen