Some discussion of the "the jacket" on my web log:

Hit the road to nowhere:

http://home.earthlink.net/~navigare/

What I wrote about "the jacket" on my web log has just been dumped into the archive, where it's hard to find, so I'm posting it here:

In William Gibson's new novel "Pattern Recognition", the heroine Cayce Pollard, a coolhunter, wears a reproduction MA-1 flight jacket, 1957 pattern, made by Buzz Rickson's, which Gibson describes as a super authentic recreation of the original -- in a sense MORE authentic than the original because of the fanatical devotion to detail by the manufacturer. He notes that the uneven seams of the original, the result of sewing the new fabric nylon on machines made to stitch cotton, have been lovingly copied, even exaggerated slightly, to make the homage that much clearer.

It turns out that Buzz Rickson's is a real company, based in Japan, and that it really does make such reproductions, hard to find and insanely expensive, with the obsessiveness Gibson so admires.

But Gibson made a mistake. He described Pollard's jacket as black, whereas Rickson's only produced the jacket in green, since that's the only way the Air Force ever issued it. When Rickson's learned about the mistake, it decided to issue a "Pattern Recognition" edition of the jacket in black. Gibson's fantasy jacket has thus become real.

This is cool on one level -- not so cool on another. Gibson's failure to remember the color of the jacket was a betrayal of the obsessiveness he so admires in Rickson's reproductions. In a sense it revealed Gibson as a consumer of Rickson's obsessiveness, not a participant in it. The jacket figures largely in the novel, in practical as well as psychological ways -- it symbolizes the heroine's own appreciation of the care devoted to its manufacture and the whole spiritual meaning of repro flight jackets.

"Pattern Recognition" is the most important book written in the 21st Century, bursting with ideas and insights into the new culture coming into being. But Gibson glances over certain implications of this new culture, can't quite get his mind -- or his plot -- around them. Somehow the coolness, and deep strangeness, of a Buzz Rickson's reproduction is acknowledged without being fully appreciated.

It leaves us with a problem. Do we want to wear Cayce Pollard's black Rickson's MA-1, which is, in fact, unutterably cool-looking, or do we want to wear the original Rickson's reproduction, which is what she and Gibson think she's wearing?

Stay tuned.

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Hit the road to nowhere:

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Oh geez, calm down. It's just a book, and just an oversight. There were black MA-1's, and BR should have been making them before. How about CP pressing send on the eMac in the Park, or the H2 with Hummer(orig.)-style windshield wipers. You're missing the forest for the trees.

According to Rickson's the Air Force never issued the MA-1 in anything but sage green. If it were anything but a Rickson's, it would just be an oversight -- but what Gibson loves about a Rickson's is its makers's obsession with detail, that's what it symbolizes in the book . . . an appreciation of something that's not generic, not interchangeable. The jacket plays a big part in the book -- Cayce's devotion to it means something. It's not like the H-2 windshield wipers at all.

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Hit the road to nowhere:

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There's a difference between the Air Force issuing them (actually they used to also issue blue ones) and them being produced . Black MA-1's, someone made them, for someone ....

You're right. Someone probably makes them in red, too -- but the point of a Rickson's is authenticity. That's what Cayce likes about their stuff.

Lloyd umm.. sorry to tell you this but...
ummm...

you really need some girl to touch your wiener soon.

NO ONE should know that much about bomber jackets...

Your point is well taken -- but the thing is . . . Gibson is also obsessed with bomber jackets, and deeply impressed by the fanatics at Buzz Rickson's who are even more obsessed.
Gibson is also obsessed with vintage U. S. Army parkas -- witness the 1951 fishtail model worn by Boone Chu in Tokyo -- and the screen name of Cayce's chief Internet ally . . . parkaboy.
In the name of God, man -- THIS MEANS SOMETHING.
And let's face it, it takes about two minutes to find out all this stuff on the Internet -- which makes you wonder why Gibson didn't take the time to get the color of the MA-1 right. Had he only heard about the jacket from someone -- never actually seen one?
I mean, come on -- the jacket plays a big role in the book. IT MEANS SOMETHING! Or am I just indulging in apophenia here?

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Hit the road to nowhere:

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Maybe Gibson knew that the original jackets were only ever issued in sage green, and he deliberately made Cayce's Rickson black just to drive obsessive fans crazy.

I personally don't think it matters all that much; the author describes a jacket of a certain sort, and I picture a jacket that fits the criteria. Having never seen an MA-1 flight jacket before, my interpretation was quite different from what they actually look like. I'm sure many fans were the same way when they read the book. *shrugs*

maybe Gibson has some sort of weird obscure-jacket fetish.. ?

hmm?

quote:

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Originally posted by Lloyd:

But Gibson made a mistake. He described Pollard's jacket as black, whereas Rickson's only produced the jacket in green, since that's the only way the Air Force ever issued it. When Rickson's learned about the mistake, it decided to issue a "Pattern Recognition" edition of the jacket in black. Gibson's fantasy jacket has thus become real.

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i am sure that gibson *deliberately* made his version of the rickson jacket black.
because it's cooler that way
and because he's creating his own world. it's fiction.
he knew what color the original was, he researched it.
and then went off down a new path
making it black pushes it into mirror world territory

ricksons then *making* a black version just makes it all even cooler

so gibson didnt make a mistake
gibson *corrected* a mistake in our spacetime continuum: black versions should always have existed and now they do

I like the idea that Gibson made the mistake deliberately and willed the black MA-1 into being -- but I still think it's more likely that he misremembered the color of the jacket.

Rickson's, which issued the new version with Gibson's cooperation, describes the black jacket in "Pattern Recognition" as a misrecollection on Gibson's part, and you'd think he would have corrected this if it was wrong.

I'd love to get Gibson's explanation of the whole episode.


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Hit the road to nowhere:

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Oddly the Actual MA-1 jacket is still made in USA,
sold for U$78, so its hard to see why anyone would pay $425 for a replica
http://www.flightjacket.com/detail.aspx?ID=18
Seems there was a blue original, sage is now authentic... but they now come in many colors.
Cobles in UK has them on ebay now for <U$40
red,silver...
sadly, shipping to Auz is U$100 so it would be A$250...
..
gbruno.tblog.com

MA-1 Jacket was very popular a few years ago in Eastern Europe. But now only skinheads wear it...
Especially the black ones.

Is "misremembered" a real word?
Do jackets come in black?
Does it matter?

Yes, versions of the MA-1 are still made, in many different colors. None of them look like the original, none of them use the same materials. They are like Tommy Hilfiger versions of an MA-1, shadows of something that was once genuinely cool.
The insanity of Buzz Rickson's, in wanting to reproduce the jacket EXACTLY as it was, and the insanity of those who pay exorbitant prices for the reproduction, is interesting as a sociological phenomenon -- but I think it means something more to Cayce, and thus to Gibson. It represents a kind of mad assault on the inauthenticity of consumerist culture.

Hit the road to nowhere:

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I feel Patern Recognition is "set" just a few years after the date it was written. Therefore when the "events" take place the jacket has become available in black.

(Aside: Maybe this is proof of the existence of time travelers.)

quote:

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The insanity of Buzz Rickson's, in wanting to reproduce the jacket EXACTLY as it was, and the insanity of those who pay exorbitant prices for the reproduction, is interesting as a sociological phenomenon -- but I think it means something more to Cayce, and thus to Gibson. It represents a kind of mad assault on the inauthenticity of consumerist culture.

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Just like people who make swords like they were made 500 years earlier, and the people who pay fortunes to own them? Or those who spend years trying to recreate a dance or a musical piece as it was made in the past? Or presenting a play as Shakespeare would have done it? Or maybe writing part of a book as Italian baroque narrative?

There are many reasons why people prefer the old ways as a reaction to the new. And in this I believe the reasons for Cayce and WG are different. Cayce likes the exclusive unstated uniqueness. She has an unique garment that most people would not give a second glance. Gibson, as always in my own view, likes the ways the old keeps on living, transformed or not, in the new world. And falsified relics, such as the Rickson, are particularly fascinating, as they show how there can be a market for a new "old". And the effort goes to show that it may be new, but it is not "fake".

quote:

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Originally posted by Lloyd:
But Gibson made a mistake.

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I believe WG commented on this in his blog. I can't remember exactly what he said though.

Which makes this post useless.

quote:

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Cayce likes the exclusive unstated uniqueness. She has an unique garment that most people would not give a second glance.

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You are probably right on that.

I really liked the story of the jacket in the book, because I liked imagining the proces of reconstruction. People who do reconstructions fascinate me, I don't know why.
The creation of the black jacket is the most amazing spin on the story, and I would really like to wear one, as I sign of profound admiration. But I'm afraid people would think I'm a skin.