EXCAVATING HOLLOW EARTH THEORY - Comp. Paranoid Analysis of "The Crying of Lot 49" & "Lodge 49" (Pt. IV)

Welcome back to ParaPower Mapping & the final installment of our four part Comparative Paranoid Analysis of "The Crying of Lot 49" & "Lodge 49". In the words of that aeronautics exec from Orbis, "We're going deep, literally. Following the path set by Jung & Pauli."

This EP's investigations include:

A history of the mythic, scientific, & crackpot manifestations of Hollow Earth theory; Nordic & Ancient Greek ex.; Thule & Hyperborea; Mircea Eliade; Zalmoxis; an unlikely Zalmoxis reference in CoL49; Hell/ Sheol; Cabala; Tibetan Buddhist legends of Shambhala; Theosophic Agartha; German folklore; a passage to the inner earth b/w Gotha & Eisenach; goblins/ kobolds; 'Alp' = 'Elf'; Nietzche; Peter Levenda; Unholy Alliance; Edmond Halley's theory of concentric spheres, based off of Isaac Newton & his "Principia"; the fact Halley's research was once again published in "Philosophical Transactions", demonstrating Hollow Earth's origins among high society (Royal Society); the German Jesuit Athanasius Kircher & "Mundus subterraneus"; monks rappelling into Vesuvius; Capt. John Cleve Symmes; Symmes's notion of the "Pole Holes"; his circular soliciting support from Congress & wealthy backers; hopes of a Siberian expedition; Mandan, Apache, & Iroquois legends; Le Clerc Milfort's expedition; Capt. Symmes's Son of the Revolution heritage; Cotton Mather's hollow earth theorizing; Pytheas's search for Thule; the Symmes monument in Hamilton, OH; Jacques Casanova's insane & disturbing incest-ridden, young adult Hollow Earth fantasy called "Icosameron"; Symmes's failed attempt to join a Russian expedition to the N. Pole; Jules Verne; the Capt. Symmes influence & connection to Edgar Allen Poe & the fact the story that put him on the map was about Hollow Earth;...

...transitioning into Hollow Earth & Nazism, we discuss the WWI flying ace & school teacher Peter Bender; his discovery of Koresh Reed Teed's "Cellular Cosmogony"; Bender's attempts to convert Germans & Nazis to his "hohlwelttheorie"; Bender's Jewish student's flight to join the Koreshan Unity Cult in Florida in the early days of the Third Reich; announcing the new miniseries on the history of Nazi occultism; Blavatsky's influence on Nazi obsessions w/ Hyperborea & Shambhala; the Thule Gesselschaft aka Thule Society; Austrian mining engineer Hans Hörbiger's "Cosmic Ice Theory"; Himmler's expedition to Tibet, which we'll return to; Bender's friendship w/ Hermann Göring via the fact they'd served together in the Luftwaffe; the Nazi Naval Research Institute calling on Bender's "Hollow Earth" theory following the failure of pendulums to locate British navy vessels; the engineer Mengering's failed rocketry project & attempt to prove Bender's theory in Magdeburg, and the fact numerous scientists that worked on V-2s later on were involved; Hitler's "holiday camp" the Colossus of Prora; Bender's expedition there, led by physicist Dr. Fischer; their use of infrared telescopic cameras, which they trained at 45 degree angles on the sky to try & spy on British ships from below (in accordance w/ Bender's theory that we live on the inside of the Earth); the utter failure of the expedition, resulting in Nazi command sending Bender & his followers to death camps; Thule Society member Prince Thurn und Taxis's involvement in the Palm Sunday Putsch, which resulted in his execution by the Red Army, shedding a whole new layer of meaning on Pynchon's use of the family; post-war UFO sightings; legends of Hitler's escape via tunnels, submarines, or flügelrads; Argentina, Patagonia, or Antarctica; Shaver stories & Ray Palmer; Viktor Schauberger's supposed saucer prototypes (likely a fabrication); the Nazi expedition to New Swabia in 1939; economic, military, exoteric, & esoteric interpretations of the possible motivations; the Dormier Wal seaplanes "Boreas" & "Passat"; Admiral Byrd's 1946 Antarctic voyage; the wild & odious story of Ernst Zündel, Neo-Nazi propagandist, Canadian Liberal Party PM candidate, cult-leader, & manipulator of the UFO community; PSA about the dangers of Nazi infiltrators in noided circles as exhibited by Zündel; his Hitler-like failed art aspirations; his attempt to charter a plane to Antarctica to search for the Holes; an abandoned Mormon trip in search of the Northern Pole Hole that was called off after the organizer's death (...?); the Russian nuclear icebreaker ship YAMAL; Charles Manson & hollow earth in Death Valley; Pynchon's use of Hollow Earth theory in "Mason & Dixon" & "Against the Day"; the real-life Schiehallion experiment in Scotland; last few alchemical references in L49; Burt the Pawnbroker's line w/ "sub rosa" in it, mirroring Pynchon's use of the phrase in CoL49, bringing our investigation full circle thru the reference to Rosicrucianism, the OSS, & Operation Paperclip; etc.

Songs: 

| Lodge 49 Theme - OST | 

| Loretta Lynn - "Coal Miner's Daughter" | 

| The Carpenters - "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" |  

| Megadeth - "Hangar 18" |