Page 197

By Jack Joseph Smith

from her temples. "The carpetbaggers go broke and become theaves again. It's just that the next time around brings embarrisoment. You see, they have the personality to become just like the rest of us. But for the big rich; Their chance of getting caught exists; Sure; Standard Oil could get squeezed; But an es- tate has more corners than an alley." "Sure...," said Jaqueline; her lips full, the corner of her mouth down to something sexy. "The thing about the real rich is: They will never have to start ever from the absolute beg- inning, unless we are invaded by Japan." "Alice in Wonderland," the young visitor said, "Begin from the beginning for psychic phenomenon explained the frog in his round about way." "No way has money in America ever been kind to a something they didn't identify with. And Amer- ica is the way of the world. So things really do come down to whatever ya got in your own bag." Jaqueline looked down beside the bed and held the rolled top of his brown paper bag with her toe. "May I introduce this man from Montreal?" asked Marie really saying it; "Looks like Hart Street might have a revolution after all, with all this French representation," replied Animal. "No offence Marie."

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

The conversation turns toward money, class recurrence, and revolution, with Hart Street jokingly framed as a place where social theory passes through bags, corners, and lived scarcity.

The talk is witty, but its underlying argument is hard. Wealth reproduces itself through structure, while everyone else remains exposed to restart, theft, shame, and improvisation. Jaqueline's quiet gesture with the paper bag keeps the abstractions tied to bodies and objects in the room.

Claude

Animal lays out a hard class theory between sips: 'carpetbaggers go broke and become theaves again,' but the 'real rich' 'will never have to start ever from the absolute beginning, unless we are invaded by Japan,' because 'an estate has more corners than an alley.' His conclusion - money 'has never been kind to a something they didn't identify with' and 'America is the way of the world,' so 'things really do come down to whatever ya got in your own bag' - is literalized when Jaqueline 'held the rolled top of his brown paper bag with her toe.' The visitor answers obliquely in 'Alice in Wonderland' and frog riddles, and Marie's formal 'May I introduce this man from Montreal?' lets Animal joke about 'French representation' and 'revolution after all' - radical argument folded into the evening's banter and bodies.