Death-Birth Continuity.
" [By the time Mark Twain} had mastered the analytic knowledge needed to pilot the Mississippi River, he discovered the river had lost its beauty. Something is always killed. But what is less noticed in the arts...something is always created too. And instead of just dwelling on what is killed it’s important also to see what’s created and to see the process as a kind of death-birth continuity that is neither good nor bad, but just is. .. We pass through a town called Marmarth but John doesn’t stop even for a rest and so we go on.“
Marmarth, ND. Notice how the town atmosphere, and evident abandonment, fit the Narrators description of the surrounding harsh terrain and the “death-birth continuity” of above passage. Also study how the lived experience of the narrator, reflects and poetically amplifies the painful telling of this terrible wrenching desolate portion of Phaedrus’ life. In the above passage, the narrator dwells on death and killing, which “fits” this harsh terrain.
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(Photo = 104-0458c ...... ZMM Page = 071 After ...... WayPt = 079`|w|' ft)