The Works Of Thomas Pynchon

[AbdoRinbo]

I'd always wondered what Thomas Pynchon thought of James Joyce, because his literary style seemed to resemble Joyce's in many ways. Well, I found this passage the other day and I've been pondering it ever since. It seems critical, but, then again, Gravity's Rainbow is a novel torn between a hundred different narrative perspectives and personalities. Who can say for sure what it means?

Anyway, my friends, here is that passage:

'He finds that he has drifted as far as the Odeon, one of the great world cafés, whose speciality is not listed anywhere--indeed has never been pinned down. Lenin, Trotsky, James Joyce, Dr. Einstein all sat out at these tables. Whatever it was they all had in common: whatever they'd come to this vantage to score . . . perhaps it had to do with the people somehow, with pedestrian mortality, restless crisscrossing of needs or desperations in one fateful piece of street . . . dialectics, matrices, archetypes all need to connect, once in a while, back to some of that proletarian blood, to body odors and senseless screaming across a table, to cheating and last hopes, or else all is dusty Dracularity, the West's ancient curse. . . .' (Gravity's Rainbow p.262)

[AbdoRinbo]

On the topic of Kerouac, Rotty, I've decided to revive this thread that no one seemed very interested in. Pynchon wrote Gravity's Rainbow with On the Road clearly in his mind, it is quite apparent. It's as if he took Kerouac's itinerant novel and stretched the story across all of the war-torn continents during WWII. I don't know, maybe you'll find it as interesting (and haunting) as I did. It's my second favorite novel next to Ulysses.

[Rotty1021]

I'll consider trying it, but I have other stuff that tops my to read list at the moment. Speaking of Ulysses, I picked that novel up in the library yesterday and read a page at random: that's some strange stuff, Abdo. It was written with such verbosity, yet I felt drawn into the writing. In short, I found it to be some of the strangest writing I've encountered.

[AbdoRinbo]

It's only 'verbose' if it tries to make a simple idea seem more complex that it is with thick layers of useless verbiage. In the case of Joyce, the idea/s behind Ulysses are so complex that the style of the novel comes off rather vague at first. Some parts of it are kind of verbose (the 'Sirens' episode, for example, though I think it is still quite lovely), but in general Ulysses is a pretty solid novel.

I could just sit down and re-read the 'Proteus' episode over and over, never get tired of it. However, the argument as to whether Finnegans Wake, Joyce's last novel, is needlessly complex is a bit foggy. The language Joyce uses is composed almost entirely of neologisms (made up words), but they carry a hefty load of symbolism with them (on average, 70 pages worth of anecdotal reading for every three words in FW). It is set in the mind of a Dubliner (who we think is named Porter, but it may very well be Leopold Bloom, the protagonist of Ulysses, dreaming, which is where the story left off; but we can't say for sure, Joyce died shortly following the completion of it). The novel is completely circular; literally, the novel begins and ends with the same sentence: the first half is the last sentence and the last half is the first sentence. You can start in the middle and read it, if you like. But for anyone unfamiliar with Joyce, the Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Ulysses are totally accessible reads. I'm afraid FW may never be a book for the common reader.

As for Pynchon, don't worry. You have your entire life to read whatever you like. As long as you know who he is, you can decide whether Gravity's Rainbow or any of his other novels (V., The Crying of Lot 49, Vineland, and Mason & Dixon) are of any interest to you. But trust me, there are only two living American authors who are able to compete with the European literary canon: Kurt Vonnegut, who is an ingenius black humorist (sort of 'Seinfeldish') and then Thomas Pynchon, the Dark Lord of satirical, impeccable (did I forget to say in utero?) historical literature. They are characteristically American in their style, which is something you don't find so much anymore (Europe dominates everything aesthetic, but I don't think they have an equivalent to Pynchon or Vonnegut . . . in fact, the closest ones I can think of are Joyce to Pynchon and Italo Calvino to Vonnegut, but not even they are easy to compare).

[Rotty1021]

Vonnegut has always tempted me. Is Slaughterhouse Five a good place to start?

[AbdoRinbo]

The Sirens of Titan was the first Vonnegut novel I read, and is still my favorite. I think that Slaughterhouse Five falls short of the vision that the Sirens had. The last line of the book causes tears to well up in my eyes, it's so funny and yet so sad.

[reader]

I agree with the previous post about Pynchon's role in the American Cannon. Pynchon is the greatest living American writer that I have read. He may be the best living writer of fiction period. Gravity's Rainbow, for instance, seems to encompass and critique every aspect of of the modern world and Man's relationship to it. It is a challenging read but well worth it. Every page of this book is bursting with idea's. Pynchon plays these ideas like a violin. At times deadly serious, at other times with hilarious playfulness. If there is one great novel of our time, this is it. And yes, Pynchon's style and prose makes one think about what a late twentieth century Joyce would be like.

I do know people who say that Cormac MCarthy is an American writer who rivals Pynchon. But I have not yet read him. Does anyone out there who has read both authors have an opinion?

[KLO]

Cormac McCarthy is fantastic. I read all of both McCarthy and Pynchon's works, and I find it difficult to compare them because they are so completely different. To me, McCarthy is far more "American" than Pynchon. Unfortunately, most people are familiar only with his Border Trilogy (All the Pretty Horses, etc.). But I don't think these are his best works. Suttree is amazing and probably the most similar to Pynchon's style, but if I had to recommend one of McCarthy's books, it would absolutely be Blood Meridian.

Anyway, those are just my thoughts. If you try out McCarthy, I would love to know what you think.

[AbdoRinbo]

Interesting, I'd like to hear your definition of 'American'.

Cormac McCarthy is, from what I've gathered, one among the countless authors-----Thomas Pynchon included-----who are indebted to James Joyce (or more precisely, Ulysses). But McCarthy seems, as opposed to Pynchon, to be a very southern type of writer. I don't know how you compare the two (I just don't). McCarthy seems more concerned with human suffering than Pynchon. I guess it's part of being a southerner. Pynchon is a New Yorker with a terribly wry sense of humor. The sad part is, a lot of people take everything he writes seriously. That he almost never comments on any of his novels makes Pynchon criticism a little suspect.

'Here is my book as I wrote it and as it should be read before commentators obscure it with their elucidations.' -- Aloysius Bertrand.

[KLO]

Well, to me, Pynchon's characters and stories seem much less rooted in American places than McCarthy's. Yes, his topics sometimes include American places and ideas (the Pony Express, logging in California, the Mason/Dixon line), but for the most part, the stories themselves seem quite separate from the place. And, of course, the focus of his two most famous?/popular? ones (Gravity's Rainbow and V) is primarily Europe.

While I agree, some of McCarthy's works are particularly Southern, not all of them are (The Border Trilogy and Blood Meridian definitely are not). Either way, though, all of them seem deeply rooted in American landscapes and the people of those places. This is what makes him seem more American to me.

[AbdoRinbo]

Gravity's Rainbow is set in war torn Europe in the 1940s, but----c'mon----we all know it's a commentary on America in the 1960s (with Richard M. Zhlubb and all).

[KLO]

So, what, if it is a comment on '60s America? It still is not centered on place, only on the idea of America.

[AbdoRinbo]

How is that any different from what you've described? Ideas are also perceptions of landscapes and people. Placement is a concept. Gravity's Rainbow signifies American culture, so-----yes-----it is an idea. What is so amazing about literally pointing to a place?

I'm not saying that Pynchon is superior in any way, but I'm still curious what you were referring to when you spoke of 'America'. If it is not an idea, what is it?

[KLO]

I probably did not define myself well earlier. Pynchon, to me, is definitely an American writer dealing with American issues. But, I do think that the American landscape, the land itself, and writers' relationships to it/portrayals of it are important in defining writers as American.

The connection to the idea of America that is not related to the place seems to me to make certain authors more universal (I don't know if that is the right word, but it is the best I can come up with at the minute).

It also just occurred to me that most postmodernist American authors seem to have the same sort of relationship to American landscapes as Pynchon does, especially Don DeLillo, and even to some extent John Barth. I don't know. Maybe this is a postmodern response to the traditional American life/history narratives?

[AbdoRinbo]

To illustrate a point, I would say that 'Seinfeld' is a particularly American comedy. This is not because it is set in New York; I think it has more to do with the general style of its humor, the symbolic aspect. It's the same everywhere of course. Monty Python is definitely English, no question.

As for Pynchon, what he lacks in place he more than makes up in personality. Even his narrative style is profoundly American (his constant use of the word 'sez', for example). I don't know, he just strikes me as very aware of his own culture. I can't imagine reading him in another language.

By the way, I'm not yet a grad. student so could you put the 'postmodern response to the traditional American life/history narratives' into less vague terms?

[Rotty1021]

I'm too dumbfounded to add anything to this conversation. Keep it up; it's quite interesting! ;)

[KLO]

Well, the postmodernists' goal is to question all of the narratives of history and life that came before them. In so doing, their aim is to demonstrate how all narratives are merely constructions and are completely unreliable. In fact, the postmodernists' insistence is often that everything is construced.

I don't know if that is clearer. I have always had a tough time defining postmodernism. :-?

[AbdoRinbo]

I know what postmodernism is (e.g. Deconstruction, Lacanian psychoanalysis, a little Foucault too), I just wasn't sure what the term 'American life/history narratives' meant exactly. I've read an excerpt from Roland Barthes 'Mythologies', and he does go into some detail about the construction of narratives by piecing together decisively picked historical events, &c. But you can apply that to anything and everything, so in the end you're just left chasing your tail around in circles.

[KLO]

Exactly! I think that is what the postmodernist Americans are trying to show, that any narrative of American history or life is not based in reality, and as hard as we may try to believe in them, we simply cannot.

[AbdoRinbo]

What about the postmodernists? I've noticed most openly admit that their narratives are just as flawed as the ones they are critiquing, but they maintain that being aware and 'rethinking' metaphysics is somehow beneficial to us. Judith Butler is a good example. I wonder what good it does us. Maybe I'm just biased towards authors like Spanos and Foucault. For example, Spanos' answer to everything is: 'if you don't accept my framework you're imperialistic.' (One should first question why we should accept anyone's framework.) Spanos might not be the quintessential postmodernist, but there are so many other out there like him with that same 'I'm more politically correct than you' attitude, which I think is nothing more (or less) than snobbery.

[KLO]

I agree that most postmodernists do tend to imply their superiority, and I think Pynchon is just as guilty of this as any of them. But, it is also what makes him interesting to me. I'm always left wondering why I should pay any attention to his view/story more than anyone else's. But I thought that is what the postmodernists want.

[AbdoRinbo]

Pynchon's 'message' is vague at best. He's a master of ambivalence; he is equally adept with raw emotion as he is with perverted humor. 'The Story of Byron the Bulb' is a good example. Each time I read this one passage I have to hold back the tears, yet, I feel a strange inclination to laugh:

'He gets to know all the bulbs in the place, Benito the Bulb over in the next sconce who's always planning an escape, Bernie down the hall in the toilet, who has all kinds of urolagnia jokes to tell, his mother Brenda in the kitchen who talks of hashish hush puppies, dildos rigged to pump floods of paregoric orgasm to the capillaries of the womb, prayers to Astarte and Lilith, queen of the night, reaches into the true Night of the Other, cold and naked on linoleum floors after days without sleep, the dreams and tears become a natural state. . . .' (GR, p.649)

Pynchon blends everything, emotions and facts. Here's another example: the ambiguity of Tyrone's conditioning (in other words, the question concerning whether his orgasms really are the principal cause of all the V-2 rocket impacts over London) seems to suggest, on one hand, that if you believe in Pavlovian conditioning (and, likewise, 'that A could do B') then you are a paranoid, but on the other, if you reject control then you are a positivist, you refuse to accept that anything is connected in any way to anything else. Throughout different parts of GR Pynchon seems to criticize both.

The only other novel of his that I have read was The Crying of Lot 49, but even it seemed more geared toward fusing Literature with Science than it did with communicating a theory of the Universe. And Pynchon's theories always seem very circular anyway. But, hey, we search for truths like we chase rainbows.

[reader]

I was reading the previous posts about Pynchon being a great commentator on the American "idea". A superb passage from Gravity's Rainbow (the book is so dense I cannot find it :evil:) comes to mind where Slothrop is awakened by American MP's pounding at his door and for a moment perceives Americans from the point of view of non Americans.

I will soon give soon McCarthy a try and will let you all know what I think.

[AbdoRinbo]

KLO, let me ask you a question. Have you read anything by Vine Deloria? You've taken up Native Studies, am I wrong? I was just going to ask you what you thought of the 'representation' of Natives by Westerners. I haven't read Mason & Dixon, but I've heard it has a very nihilistic theme to it. Are Pynchon and Deloria thinking along the same lines, is Mason & Dixon just a critique of American colonialism and expansion? I heard it has a very absurd ending, very nihilistic. Anyway, I'm always happy to hear your thoughts.

[sloegin]

I have not read Deloria. I finished M&D awhile ago. Compared to GR:it is chronologically easier to follow, he doesn't mock you like in parts of GR. It appears to me that his libido is diminishing. I wouldn't call it nihilistic, more that he is getting older and has realized his mortality and is redefining what is important in life.

[KLO]

Sorry, I've been away for a while...

I have read Deloria. And he seems to me to be at the forefront of postmodernism and postmodern criticism in Native American literature.

Representations of Natives by Caucasion authors was the focus of my research for my dissertation, and I believe there has continually been a struggle for white writers to portray Native characters. Up until the 20th century, most writers were deeply influenced by the dominant social ideals of their times (Rowlandson, Cooper, Thoreau, for example).

With the 20th century, I think a number of writers begin to try to present realistic Native characters based on Native people that the authors knew. For example, Willa Cather and Robert Penn Warren's works move progressively from idealistic visions of noble savages to more realistic portrayals of real Native individuals. Faulkner does the opposite.

To come back to Pynchon, then, what is most interesting to me about him and other postmodernists is their almost complete avoidance of Native American characters(see Barth, DeLillo, and Pynchon). Native Americans often serve as backdrops or subjects of stories that characters in postmodern works tell, but they do not physically enter the larger stories (or if they do, they are a vague group as in Mason & Dixon). I haven't made up my mind just why most postmodern authors do this, but I will continue to ponder it. ;)

[AbdoRinbo]

Do they (Pynchon, DeLillo, &c.) have an obligation to represent Indians a certain way? I heard someone arguing that Joyce was anti-semitic because he left Leopold Bloom uncircumcised in Ulysses (i.e., he didn't care enough for Judaism to get it 'right', which was tantamount to jew-hatred). Reminds me of Edward Said and the 'Orientalism' critique. Which leads me to ponder: what about the representation of Westerners by the Orient and, likewise, the representation of Americans by the Natives? Are the cultures we marginalize purely innocent, or are they perpetuating the same flawed perception that we have for alien societies? In other words, how can we solve a problem that exists on both sides when we're only rethinking our own orientation? We can't just impose our framework on them, because that seems to be the problem postmodernists are trying to resolve.

I think it's always gonna be a viscious circle.

[KLO]

I agree; it is a vicious circle. What interests me about the postmodernists though is that they do bring up marginalized people in their works who seem to be an important force, but they fail to even address them as individuals. Is this an attempt to NOT follow the same old stereotypes and portrayals? I just haven't been persuaded by that argument yet. Do they feel restricted by the emphasis on not imposing Western frameworks on Native cultures? I find that hard to imagine since the postmodernists seem to address most contemporary issues and cultural crises, but if so, then it's disappointing.

[Sindhu]

(I wasn't sure where to post this- here or on the Orientalism Thread- but since this seems to lead directly into what I want to say I'm first posting here ( AND I'm going to cut and paste onto the Orientalism thread, so you can just endure it twice! ;) )
First, Said's basic point in Orientalism is welltaken, but there is overkill when he says "Every European in what he could say about the orient was consequently a racist, an imperialist and almost totally ethnocentric." This amouts to submitting to Orientalism completely, making escape or variation, by definition impossible, even unthinkable. Such sweeping condemnations (one of the best illustrations is Said's famous phrase about Marx "scuttling back to stand safely in an orientalied orient") are seriously problematic. In relation to Said's dismissal of Byron as an Orientalist, Harish Trivedi (in Colonial Transactions) flatly asserts "In this unsubstantiated assertion, Said's geography is vague, his chronology is shaky and he has got hold of the wrong man as well." Byron is just one example, the role of the individual mind has to be kept in focus even while accepting the "censor of orientalism", as Said himself grants in Culture and Imperialism.
Secondly, Said overrates the power of Orientalism. The phrases "the internal consistency of Orientalism" and "the sheer knitted together strength of Orientalism" are very problematic. HomiBhabha and Gayatri Spivak among others have examined how the terrain of Orientalist discourse was a very fissured one indeed. (My own research deals with the ambivalences in Imperial/orientalist discourse and the amount of sheer selfcontradiction and amorphous rhetoric that is revealed is astounding)
Third, coming to Said's point about essentialisation, even accepting for arguments sake that it is a henious offence, the fact remains that interaction between cultures or for that matter individuals would be impossible without some measure of essentialising. Even statements that merely state the race, gender, interests and orientations of a person are by definition essentialising statements and how is conversation to take place without these?
Fourthly and finally, if there was an Orientalism, there was just as much of an Occidentalism.Achebe's famous essay where he labels Conrad a thorough going racist (as a piece of writing it is one of the most well written and intersting essays I have come across)is a pretty good example. No culture is "innocent" in it's depiction of the "Other" and this needs to be recognized, not so much as to soften the attacks on Orientalism, but because Occidentalism was often the most potent weapon of political fightback in colonized countries.
I would like to add however, that the scales are not completely balanced between Orientalism and Occidentalism - in the Imperial age at least, Orientalism served to consolidate power, it was the dominant voice. Occidentalism, while having an equally "real" existence had by force of circumstances to be articulated from the margins and was more of a defence strategy than a controlling one.

.
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[AbdoRinbo]

In America's Shadow: An Anatomy of Empire, William V. Spanos begins by quoting Said's Culture and Imperialism:


In the expansion of the great Western empires, profit and hope of further profit were obviously tremendously important. . . . But there is more than that to imperialism and colonialism. There was a commitment to them over and above profit, a commitment in constant circulation and recirculation, which, on the one hand, allowed decent men and women to accept the notion that distant territories and their native peoples should be subjugated, and, on the other, replenished metropolitan energies so that these decent people could think of the imperium as a protracted, almost metaphysical obligation to rule subordinate, inferior or less advanced peoples.

What caught my interest was the parallel drawn between Imperialism and Metaphysics. The 'commitment to them over and above profit' might imply the connotations of the word 'meta', which are 'over', 'above', and sometimes 'after'. This topic interests me deeply because of the view of history that it supports, the idea that all history is a movement toward some final manifestation (which the Christians believe is the final manifestation of God). What would you say the final cause of Western Imperialism would be? Is it simply the 'Occidentalization' (for lack of a more lucid term) of the world? Can power truly ease our anxiety and our nihilistic tendencies?

[Sindhu]

The concept of "meta" as over and above, in my opinion cannot refer to the "occidentalization" of the world. The profit motif is firmly entrenched in the imperial enterprise, and if "occidentalization" were completely acheived, that avenue would be simply cut off. The metaphysical obligation is most probably part of the rationalising/justifying process. The "decent people" that Said refers to would not be capable of articulating the concept of "Exterminate the Brutes" in clear accents with easy consciences. So, a further justification of the imperium was needed, as something defenitely "over and Above" the profit motif, but not to the extent that would turn the Other into the Same. The "less advanced people" are to be reformed, but just upto that particular point where they remain not quite white/right.
To quote Stephen Greenblatt in this context, the "meta" part of the whole argument was"a sign of ethical reservation". I would paraphrase this as a justification, not intentended for those actually affected by imperialism, but for a world elsewhere, for the "decent people" at "Home"
And no, power certainly cannot, at least in my opinion ease anxieties, in fact it only adds to them. BUt that doesn't seem to deter people from trying, which is why the theory if not the practice of Empire among other power equations is constantly trying to reconcile the irreconcilable.

[AbdoRinbo]

Please explain to me how Occidental Imperialism can not be metaphysical. The rationalizing/justifying process is exactly what is in question here, so I think it is relevent.

I once e-mailed Stephen Greenblatt, but he never wrote back. :( ;)

. . . and I once crank called William V. Spanos.

Hee hee hee hee.

:evil: :evil: :evil:

[den]

:x gah! you would, wouldn't you! :P


. . . and I once crank called William V. Spanos.

Hee hee hee hee.

:evil: :evil: :evil:

[AbdoRinbo]

No, I did. ;)

[Sindhu]

Please explain to me how Occidental Imperialism can not be metaphysical. The rationalizing/justifying process is exactly what is in question here, so I think it is relevent.


Of course Occidental Imperialism CAN BE and IS metaphysical.
What I said was:"The concept of "meta" as over and above, in my opinion cannot refer to the "occidentalization" of the world."- as a reply to your earlier question:"What would you say the final cause of Western Imperialism would be? Is it simply the 'Occidentalization' (for lack of a more lucid term) of the world?"
Imperialism definitely was "metaphysical to the extent that those who tried to justify it went to the extent of sometimes denying human agency altogether "Empire is a substance which has hitherto defied and will always defy the power of man to fix in any desired shape. it is mutable, from causes beyond the control of human wisdom."[Sir John Malcolm]
You can't get more metaphysical than that!
My point, once again is that the idea behind all this metaphysical justification of imperialism was not "the occidentalization" of the globe, for if that happened, the rationale for empire would disappear.


What would you say the final cause of Western Imperialism would be? Is it simply the 'Occidentalization' (for lack of a more lucid term) of the world? Can power truly ease our anxiety and our nihilistic tendencies?
In this context, have you read Nigel Leask's Anxieties of Empire? Leask's argument is that Empire begot more anxities than it was worth. My own thesis argues precisely the contrary, that the "complacencies" of Empire far outweighed the anxieties. But Leask does have a point and it is well argued and fascinatingly documented.

[AbdoRinbo]

Sindhu, I had asked you, essentially, two questions: what is the final end of Imperialism, and is 'occidentalization' that end? I'm looking but I don't see an answer in either of your responses. Are you implying that there is no end, no final goal that the imperialists have in sight? Because I think they do have an end, though it might be flawed. I mean, since they believe that their culture alone represents Truth, their final cause must be to conquer and subordinate (or outright annihilate) cultures which, in comparison, seem savage and backwards. They're trying to preserve the Universal Truth that has endowed them with power: that the Occident has a metaphysical obligation to conquer and control every inferior race on the planet (and that is 'occidentalization'). Of course (the viscious circle continues), it is only because the Occident is in power that it can claim any rights to Absolute Truth. But again, there is purpose, even if it is (to use the parlance of postmodernism) a self fulfilling prophecy.

[Sindhu]

Ok, I think I get your questions now and here are my responses- YES, the imperialists do have a ultimate goal and NO, that goal is not occidentalization. The ultimate goal is dominance and just the modicum of occidentalization required to disguise that desire for dominance as not completely self serving. The point on which we are talking at tangents seems to be that you are suggesting
TotalOccidentalization, as implied by the words "outright annihilate".
That would be a self defeating goal for the imperialists and the difference I am trying to stress is between the degrees of Occidentalization desired or allowed which are very important. To use imperialist racist phraseology itself, a good subordinate "native" with all his backward cultural background is more praised and "respected" (very conveniently andhypocritically) than the "WOGS" who are simultaneously the products of occidentalization and the challenge to it.
To go back- the ultimate goal is power/dominance and occidentalization is a adjunct to be measured out in self serving doses. The degreeis what I am stressing as important, not the process
And the bits about "preservingthe "Absolute Truths" and "metaphysical obligations" have always been afterthoughts developed once it was discovered that imperialism was profitable, the imperial enterprise did not start off with a desire to spread "absolute truths".
If I'm still not making sense, do say so, I'm enjoying this discussion.

[AbdoRinbo]

I am enjoying this immensely, Sindhu. ;) If I sound condescending (i.e., I go into useless detail about things you obviously already know) it's because I want to open this discussion up to everyone who is interested.

Anyway, I don't even know where to begin evaluating the end of Imperialism because, like I said before, the power to claim superiority is the superiority to claim power (that's the self-fulfilling prophecy). For the Occident, the end must be pure domination----Imperialism. However, to achieve that kind of power, one must be part of the Occident, that's a prerequisite. So, in a sense, occidentalization is an end because it is, on one hand, the justification for Imperialism and, on the other, the end result of it. Occidentalization and dominance go hand-in-hand.

However, the question arises as to what would occur if the tables were turned: what if the Orient possessed that kind of power, what would happen? Is the imperialist mindset particularly a western phenomenon or is it simply a by-product of power?

[Sindhu]

I am enjoying this immensely, Sindhu. ;) If I sound condescending (i.e., I go into useless detail about things you obviously already know) it's because I want to open this discussion up to everyone who is interested.
And here I was worried to death whether Iwas being iidiotic :oops:



Occidentalization and dominance go hand-in-hand.

I have to disagree here- if Occidentalization were acheived, then WHO would there be left to be dominated? Tht's what I've been stressing from the beginning-by emphazising degreesof occidentalization.


However, the question arises as to what would occur if the tables were turned: what if the Orient p
ossessed that kind of power, what would happen? Is the imperialist mindset particularly a western phenomenon or is it simply a by-product of power?
No, Idon't think that the imperalist mindset is a particularly inherent Western phenomenon. Things could have been different if the tables were changed. The considering of Other cultures as inferior has by no means been the perogative of the West - For the Chinese, all outsiders were barbarians, and in Indian tradition those who were not born in the "Varnashrma" or caste tradition in India were universally "Mlecchas" or inferiors. But there does seem to be a difference produced by economic, and even climatic conditions between the way the East and West translated this "Our culture is superior"feeling into action- the East withdrew into itself- the Great Wall of China and the Vedic prohibition of crossing the seas are examples- not wanting to be "contaminated by "inferior cultures". The West did the exact opposite and set out on voyages of discovery, which culminated in imperialism.
So, while the sueriority complex which underlaid the imperialist project at some level was certainly not a Western perogative, the actions which produced imperialism in a tangible form were initiated by the West - and it is debatable whether this was merely because the East did not have the requisite power or because there was a genuine conflict of philosophies.
Am I making sense!!? :rolleyes:

[Isagel]

You are making perfect sense, and I didn´t know anything about this before. Now I have to buy the old Orientalism, and the new one. If I understood correct he wrote a new one recently? Well, I guess we can continue this discussing under the orientalism thread. I´m eager to learn more about this. I´ll copypaste this, and look forward to more information.

[Sindhu]

I am enjoying this immensely, Sindhu. ;)
Would you check out Isagel's post and my reply on the Orientalism thread Abdo?(hope the shortened version is OK!) and if it's all right with you and everyone else could we carry on this discussion there, we can't perpetually be switching between two threads! :rolleyes: Post your reply to my last here though,it wouldn't IMO link up with what is already there.

[sloegin]

News (http://dvd.ign.com/articles/436/436093p1.html?fromint=1) of Pynchon doing a cameo on The Simpsons.

[AbdoRinbo]

I remember they used to make all kinds of Pynchon references on Mystery Science Theater 3000. I kinda miss that show.

Are you referring to the episode in which Lisa reads Gravity's Rainbow?

[sloegin]

No, he is supposed to be in an episode.

[AbdoRinbo]

Thomas Pynchon, or someone pretending to be him?

I know a guy who owns a used bookstore off-campus at UofM who claims to have seen him when he was working at a bookstore in New York, around the time Mason & Dixon had just come out.

[sloegin]

Him. Read the first page of the article. Have you read BMW Schrapnels article on him?

If you are trying to get your name in all the box thingys, tell me and I'll stop replying for the present.

[Sindhu]

If you are trying to get your name in all the box thingys, tell me and I'll stop replying for the present.
Good idea- you'll save a lot of energy, because if that IS his intention, Abdo isn't going to be the first one to stop! ;)

[AbdoRinbo]

This is awesome! Pynchon is such a mystery to me. I can't wrap my head around it, what provoked him?

[sloegin]

:D I know, I just found out to. Here (http://www.pynchon.pomona.edu/bio/adventures.html) is the BMW Schrapnel article. Why, I'm guessing he's a fan of the show.

[AbdoRinbo]

I have this feeling that guy is full of ****.

Like Pynchon's his fairy god mother or something . . .

[sloegin]

I thought that too, when I first read it. Now, I'm not so sure. I read the rest of his online work and the guy seems to be on the level. Although something still smells of epoisses. If it was a fake, I think we would know about it, like the Wanda Tidnsky Papers, he said someplace that they weren't his. Here (http://mywebpages.comcast.net/mckeer/) is the rest of his work. The archives are on the right. This is where I got 'omphaloskepsis'.

[AbdoRinbo]

I've read more convincing accounts of Pynchon encounters that I still didn't believe. But, hey, what do I know?

[sloegin]

I sympathize with you. I guess we'll know when his next book comes out.

[AbdoRinbo]

Have you read anything about it? It's supposed to revolve around the lives of this group of mathematicians, kind of a love story. It was a long time ago that I read the article, though.

[sloegin]

Henry Holt spilled the beans. I read it to, that's all I know. Can we be desultory? Tell me about Calvino, I have yet to read his work.

[AbdoRinbo]

Italo Calvino~

He wrote child-ish, science fiction love stories with swirls of genius that still sparkle.

The first story in Cosmicomis had me on the floor laughing and crying, overflowing with emotion. You know, as much as I love Joyce and Pynchon, Calvino just knows how to rub all the right places, he does it much better.

[sloegin]

If on a Winter's Night a Traveler, looks good. I'll check it out. Thanks for the info.
Here is a passage you should enjoy from The Body Artist by Delillo. Don't know if you read it.

In the first days back she ate a clam from hell and spent a number of subsequent hours scuttling to the toilet. But at least she had her body back. There's nothing like a raging crap, she thought, to make mind and body one.

[AbdoRinbo]

Clams from hell . . . hehehe.

[sloegin]

That's what you get for eating seafood.

[AbdoRinbo]

It's like the ice: if it doesn't like you, you've got problems.

[sloegin]

I used to sleep on a frozen lake, it was a trip. Unimaginable sounds.

[AbdoRinbo]

Skipping rocks on a frozen lake makes whistling sounds.

[sloegin]

Please elaborate on the 'childish', in relation to Calvino.

[AbdoRinbo]

He's very playful, his imagination is like that of a child's.

[sloegin]

Okay dokey, sounds good. Thanks.

[AbdoRinbo]

When it's more than ok . . .

It's okie dokie. ;)

[sloegin]

I suppose it should have been 'okealy dokealy, neighbor-roony', but oh well.
I was watching Trainspotting, tonight and there is a scene straight from GR(the escape into the toilet). In Rushdie's Midnight's Children, he remakes the 'electric toad'. Who else has been directly influenced, or if you prefer, stolen from Pynchon?

[ihrocks]

Resurrecting this thread because I'm currently reading "GR" and some of the comments on the Joyce thread also apply to Pynchon. He's a very dense writer, so re-reading seems almost essential. I'm also reading slowly, allowing myself time to absorb all the layers, letting my mind process all that's being said for a few days before moving on with the "story" which seems less important than what Pynchon is saying about American culture. Immediately, one can see to connection to America in the 1960s, because of the built-in ambiguity of both the personalities of the characters and the narrative style, and the distrust of the military-industrial complex, including the conspiratorial nature of the true authority (so timely given the 40th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination is upon us and people are still weaving conspiracy theories).

Enjoying it tremendously, by the way, and recommend it to anyone interested.

ihrocks

[AbdoRinbo]

How far into it are you?

[nicholasburrus]

sorry can't help

[ihrocks]

Not terribly far, unfortunately.

A couple of the 900 characters are talking about finding ways to keep their experimental "work" going after the war. This is after, I think, our, um, hero's hallucinogenic trip down the toilet (brilliant!). I'm hoping to make further progress this weekend.

ihrocks

[fayefaye]

oh, that guy talking about meeting pynchon? I find that so ridiculously hard to believe.

[AbdoRinbo]

Heh, wait till you get to 'The Story of Byron the Bulb' . . . even Joyce's imagination pales in comparison to it.

It's out of this world.

[fayefaye]

Wasn't it supposed to be a parody anyway?

You know, I went to five book stores today and not one of them had Gravity's Rainbow. :(

oh, abdo: you'll get a kick out of this: I put 'the story of byron the bulb' into google, and IT CAME UP WITH ONE OF YOUR POSTS!! That's pretty cool, hey. Part of the 'what is the best short story of all time' thread. It's like the eighth thingy that comes up on google. I think that's cool, anyway. :)

[AbdoRinbo]

Most of Gravity's Rainbow is parody of other novels.

[sloegin]

For those of you in the land of, Bush...Pynchon, should have a part on The Simpsons, this Sunday.

[Kinch]

Thanks for the update, sloegin.

[star blue]

that's just fantastic.

[sloegin]

I'm counting the hours.

[star blue]

five more hours . . .

[sloegin]

O, the anticipation.

[star blue]

one more hour.

[star blue]

thirty seconds of pure and total satisfaction.

[sloegin]

It was great.

[star blue]

touche.

[barely_real]

Originally posted by AbdoRinbo
I know what postmodernism is (e.g. Deconstruction, Lacanian psychoanalysis, a little Foucault too), I just wasn't sure what the term 'American life/history narratives' meant exactly. I've read an excerpt from Roland Barthes 'Mythologies', and he does go into some detail about the construction of narratives ...

NB: You've just described poststructuralism, which shouldn't be confused with postmodernism.

[star blue]

some philosophers make that distinction, though, the two are not mutually exclusive.

by the way, you were talking to a guy who's been banned.

[barely_real]

Gosh, I was wondering what the little "banned" tag meant. Thanks so much.

Exclusive or not, the two terms have no necessary connection. Getting them mixed up is a common mistake. I suggest you avoid it, but if you think it's worth exploring, hey, best of luck.

[star blue]

c'mon, do you honestly think that there is no necessary (real?) connection between postmodernism and poststructuralism? I can understand making that distinction when referring to certain ideas like deconstruction and schizoanalysis, &c., but when speaking of authors like foucault and pynchon, 'postmodern' is just a general way of describing the two.

[barely_real]

Originally posted by star blue
c'mon, do you honestly think that there is no necessary (real?) connection between postmodernism and poststructuralism?

Maybe instead of "real" I'd prefer "intrinsic." There are all kinds of casual connections between the two; even my post overstated the connection between, say, Derrrida's thought and Foucault's, as if there were some easy way to gloss over distinctions between the two. I really don't think it's a good idea to start out a conversation by saying, "I know what postmodernism is - it's poststructuralism!" That's a basic mistake, and we both know that this is a pretty basic treatment of the subject (unlike the discussion of Said that followed).



I can understand making that distinction when referring to certain ideas like deconstruction and schizoanalysis, &c., but when speaking of authors like foucault and pynchon, 'postmodern' is just a general way of describing the two.

I agree with you that "postmodern" is a general way of describing a bunch of writers. In fact, I think that might be my point. But I'm not so sure I'd describe Foucault or Lacan as distinctly postmodern, any more than I'd describe Pynchon (or how about Sterne? Joyce? Nabokov?) as "poststructuralist." The footnote was a warning not to confuse the two, that's all.

[star blue]

agreed, I wouldn't say the two are interchangeable. I don't consider pynchon or joyce to be poststructuralists either, that's why I seldom ever use that term in a conversation, it has a pretentious ring to it. 'postmodern' is much more familiar and is a generic enough modifier that you can pretty much use it to talk about anything post-wwII.

poststructuralism is just a facet of postmodernism, in my opinion.

[star blue]

so what's the story on pynchon's new novel, sloegin?

[sloegin]

No news on the book.

Other news: Brian McHale, will be giving a brain enema, to a bunch of poor souls in April, in D.C.
There is also a film I just found out about, called-Thomas Pynchon: A Journey into the mind of P. The production company doesn't have a 'buy' link.

[star blue]

I like it that they refer to him in the title as P.

[sloegin]

Me too.
Have you seen it?

[star blue]

no, this is the first I've heard of it. I googled it but didn't come up with a link to any company that was selling it.

[Sitaram]

http://www.hyperarts.com/pynchon/gravity/


The novel's title, Gravity's Rainbow, refers to the rocket's vapor arc, a cruel dark parody of what God sent Noah to symbolize his promise never to destroy humanity again. History has been a big trick: the plan is to switch from floods to obliterating fire from the sky.

It's pretty much impossible to follow a standard plot; one must have faith that each manic episode is connected with the great plot to blow up the world with the ultimate rocket. There is not one story, but a proliferation of characters (Pirate Prentice, Teddy Bloat, Tantivy Mucker-Maffick, Saure Bummer, and more) and events that tantalize the reader with suggestions of vast patterns only just past our comprehension. You will enjoy Pynchon's cartoon inferno far more if you consult Steven Weisenburger's brief companion to the novel, which sorts out Pynchon's blizzard of references to science, history, high culture, and the lowest of jokes. Rest easy: there really is a simple reason why Kekulé von Stradonitz's dream about a serpent biting its tail (which solved the structure of the benzene molecule) belongs in the same novel as the comic-book-hero Plastic Man.

Kierkegaard said that being a Christian should not be an easy task. The same is true, I think, in literature. For, the safer literature gets, the more it comes to resemble TV. Yes, on the surface this book is difficult, even pretentious. But if you work at it, that is, actually make an effort to understand Pynchon's somewhat obscure references and his abstruse vocabulary, the results are most rewarding. Simply put, he's not going to spoonfeed literature to his audience. Nor, as a reader, should you want to be spoonfed.


http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_gr.html

The graphics on this next link are worth the wait:

http://www.themodernword.com/gr/

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_quotes.html

He had decided long ago that no Situation had any objective reality: it only existed in the minds of those who happened to be in on it at any specific moment. Since these several minds tended to form a sum total or complex more mongrel than homogeneous, The Situation must necessarily appear to a single observer much like a diagram in four dimensions to an eye conditioned to seeing the world in only three. Hense the success of failure of any diplomatic issue must vary directly with the degree of rapport achieved by the team confronting it. This had led to the near obsession with teamwork which had inspired his colleagues to dub him Soft-show Sydney, on the assumption that he was at his best working in front of a chorus line.
But it was a neat theory, and he was in love with it.The only consolation he drew from the present chaos was that his theory managed to explain it.
--V., Chapter Seven, Part VII

number of frail girls . . . prisoners in the top room of a circular tower, embroidering a kind of tapestry which spilled out the slit windows and into a void, seeking hopelessly to fill the void: for all the other buildings and creatures, all the waves, ships and forests of the earth were contained in this tapestry, and the tapestry was the world.
--The Crying of Lot 49, Chapter 1


It's been a prevalent notion. Fallen sparks. Fragments of vessels broken at the Creation. And someday, somehow, before the end, a gathering back to home. A messenger from the Kingdom, arriving at the last moment. But I tell you there is no such message, no such home -- only the millions of last moments . . . nothing more. Our history is an aggregate of last moments.
--Gravity's Rainbow, V148

Kekulé dreams the Great Serpent holding its own tail in its mouth, the dreaming Serpent which surrounds the World. But the meanness, the cynicism with which this dream is to be used. The Serpent that announces, "The World is a closed thing, cyclical, resonant, eternally-returning," is to be delivered into a system whose only aim is to violate the Cycle. Taking and not giving back, demanding that "productivity" and "earnings" keep on increasing with time, the System removing from the rest of the World these vast quantities of energy to keep its own tiny desperate fraction showing a profit: and not only most of humanity -- most of the World, animal, vegetable, and mineral, is laid waste in the process. The System may or may not understand that it's only buying time. And that time is an artificial resource to being with, of no value to anyone or anything but the System, which must sooner or later crash to its death, when its addiction to energy has become more than the rest of the World can supply, dragging with it innocent souls all along the chain of life.
--Gravity's Rainbow, V412


What are the stars but points in the body of God where we insert the healing needles of our terror and longing?
--Gravity's Rainbow, V699


http://www.majorweather.com/pandm/index.htm

Reading Thomas Pynchon together with Herman Melville may at first
seem a strange enterprise; but for some obvious connections — both
major American authors of big American novels — they seem too
disparate to be studied side by side. But at least one major critic has
argued that Gravity’s Rainbow is in large part a rewriting of Moby-Dick.
Our close readings of these two often difficult writers, and our
complication of those readings with contemporary theories of
intertextuality and contemporary writing technologies, will lead us to
rethink issues of literary periods and styles, of historical frameworks,
and of the politics of representation.




http://www.readin.com/books/rainbow/thebook.html

I have read Gravity's Rainbow many times; and yet I still do not fully understand it. Currently (since the middle of 1999) I am participating in a group read (GRGR) over the internet, via the Thomas Pynchon mailing list server. If you're interested in joining the list, browse over to W.A.S.T.E. for info. And look in the list archive for GRGR messages; you will find much of interest.

Something I want to say about GR: the first several times I read it, I would sometimes be reading along and realize that I had lost track of what was going on. In such situations I would just continue reading, intoxicated by the beauty of the language, and generally within a page or two I would get back on track. This time through I have finally learned to go back when I realize I am lost, and pick up from terra cognita. This strategy is serving me well in terms of understanding the thing.

I must admit, though, that in my most recent reading of it (the only time I got through to the end), I spent almost the entire last 200 pages in that intoxicated non-understanding state, and never did pick back up the thread. I can only hope this time will be different... The GRGR should help a lot; I am hoping we do not lose steam.

How I read the book

It took me 10 years and at least 5 attempts to read GR in full. Every couple of years I would pick the book up from my "to read" shelf and plunge into it; each time I would get about 100 to 200 pages further along than I had previously. The book gets difficult very quickly, because you are expected when reading it to keep juggling in your mind many different plots and subplots -- when the book is at its simplest there are about 5 separate plots, each involving its own characters; interplot relationships are revealed very sparingly where they exist, and mostly left up to the reader's imagination.

The solution that worked for me is to just put the book down when it gets too confusing; wait a year and start over from the beginning. Through repetition you begin to know by heart the first chapters of the book -- this makes it much easier to get the permutations and interconnections later on, plus you start getting the jokes (which are really the heart of Gravity's Rainbow).

So this time through I'm hoping I'll finally start understanding some of the bizarrery that makes up Part 4, "The Counterforce". (Right now I only have an inadvertent hint to go on.)

http://www.mat.upm.es/~jcm/pynchon-2.html

Thomas Pynchon: Gravity's Rainbow
Roger sings to a girl in Cuxhaven who still carries Jessica's name:


I dream that I have found us both again,
With spring so many stranger's lives away,
And we, so free,
Out walking by the sea,
With someone else's paper words to say....

They took us at the gates of green return,
Too lost by then to stop, and ask them why --
Do children meet again?
Does any trace remain,
Along the superhighways of July?

Driving now suddenly into such a bright gold bearding of slope and field that he nearly forgets to steer around the banked curve....

http://www.personal.psu.edu/staff/k/x/kxs334/academic/fiction/pynchon_rainbow.html

It is already commonplace to identity Gravity's Rainbow as "postmodern." The most eminent characteristic of Pynchon's postmodernity is "paranoia" in a word. The text resists any chronological order, integral meaning of words, mimetic production of reality. Signs lose their signified, which lead to the infinite possibility of impossibility of signifying anything. The reader as well as Slothrop is left with floating mysterious signs, from which, as shown in Freud and Lacan's observations of paranoia, the paranoid either receives too many messages from the "beyond," or finds absolutely NO meaning in things and words. It is, however, pointless to claim the free play of signifiers only. The metaphors and motifs used in Gravity's Rainbow, in fact, sarcastically point to several historical incidents and religious ideologies. Among those, I think the V-2 rocket (along with other missile/bomb metaphors) and the Messenger (Hermes, Angel, Sign, Revelation) are important. In the theological and textual sense, the Messenger is the one who is supposed to know the ablosute signified of the mysterious sign from God. The Messenger is the Signifier uttered by God, the scream that comes across the sky (like the "thunderclap" in Joyce's Finnegan's Wake and T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land). In Gravity's Rainbow, this Angel often overlaps the V-2 missile, a historically specific metaphor of the WWII. V-2 is the omnipresence per se. Slothrop attempts to find the transcendental meaning of the Message in V-2, the black and white rocket, or his phallus. This quest for the Reason of the WWII--what exactly happened in the war?--collapses toward the end of the novel, along with the organic world of meaning and phallic masculinity of the one and true Slothrop. The novel seems like an attempt to reach the "beyond" of black and white, "They" and "We," subject and object, Force and Counterforce, etc. For this goal, Pynchon seems to have thrown every kind of signifier into the text, which results in paranoia. What remains after the launch of V-2 is not a free play of signifiers, but the strategy of incessantly decentering the location of any possible signified.



Gravity's Rainbow is also categorized as Science Fiction, along with Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five. From the hard-core SF readers, however, Gravity's Rainbow have received cold look, since it is not quite SF for them. It is true that GR is welcomed only by academics. It is that kind of book which cannot be read without lectures or serious researches on the jargons used in the book. Personally, I enjoyed reading this book, but only with lectures by a professor specializing in Pynchon. Thus, it is called either a masterpiece or trash. Another point from SF fans is that the same sort of incomprehensible funky punky fiction was written by authors like Phillip K. Dick, in a much mature way. To me, Dick and Pynchon are very different, though. Why has GR been called SF in the first place? Is it that incomprehensibility of words and hallucinatory stories, just like the reason Naked Lunch is categorized as SF? In terms of technology, GR never goes beyond 1945 industry of the V-2 and atomic bomb. Imipolex G (what kind of name is that?) is a sort of polyester fiber, which does not seem futuristic at all. (By the way, the word "Imipolex" always sounds to me, a Japanese speaker, like Imi (which means "meaning" in Japanese) and polex (which implies "poly," many), thus multi-meaning!). In either way, the commonalities of Japanese SF and Pynchon's GR are not few. Recently, Neon Genesis Evangelion, a TV anime series released in Tokyo, showed certain similarities to GR, which are 1) WWII, 2) religious metaphors, esp. Angel the messenger, and 3) paranoia. Is this the symptom of postmodernity???

http://toosmallforsupernova.org/embroideringearthsmantle.jpg



There are a number of frail girls . . . prisoners in the top room of a circular tower, embroidering a kind of tapestry which spilled out the slit windows and into a void, seeking hopelessly to fill the void: for all the other buildings and creatures, all the waves, ships and forests of the earth were contained in this tapestry, and the tapestry was the world.
--The Crying of Lot 49, Chapter 1


This little passage is not from "Gravity's Rainbow" but rather from "The Crying of Lot 49."

But this little passage is an entire novel in itself. It is a nuclear explosion, a tsunami, a Krakatoa.

Allow me to do some wild, extemporaneous, expository conjecture.

Let's go word by word, phrase by phrase:

"a number of" = the human race, all who have ever lived or shall ever live; the collective consciousness of the Zeitgeist.

"frail" = humanity in one word, frail, weak, ineffectual, self-destructive, sisysphean.

"girls" = humanity is basically feminine. God or the Universe is masculine. The final line of Goethe's Faust speaks of "the eternal feminine which draws us above," it is Beatrice which draws Dante upward.

"prisoners" = "the mind is its own beautiful prisoner" e.e. cummings

"top room" = upper chamber, the mystical supper

"tower" = tower of Babel, ivory tower, Borges "library of Babel"

"embroidering" = Socrate's warp, woof, and shuttle of the dialectal process.
These frail young women are all faithful Penelopes, fending off the Philistine suitors, awaiting Odysseus return.

"which spilled out" = Rapunsel lets down her hair for her lover to ascend.

[Sitaram]

I finally purchased a copy, paperback, $17, Penguin. They have a more expensive edition also, a heavier book, $24. I prefered lighter and cheaper.



Yesterday happened to be a good day. They found a child, alive, a little girl, half-suffocated under a Morrison shelter. Waiting for the stretcher, Slothrop held her small hand, gone purple with the cold. Dogs barked in the street. When she opened her eyes and saw him her first words were, "Any gum, chum?"
- from page 24




Ruins he goes daily to look in are each a sermon on vanity. That he finds, as weeks wear on, no least fragment of any rocket, preaches how indivisible is the act of death...
- from page 25



So, I ask myself "Self, how is one to read such a ponderous book?"

Self takes my hand, leads me to the river bank, beneath a tree, explaining: "How should we climb the Empire State?"

"Well," I reply, "you certainly don't stare at the spire atop. Oh no. You kiss every brick. Yes! That's it! Kiss every brick, one by one, and eventually you shall be at the spire, Fay Wray in hand."

"A brick is not a building, but a building is bricks." This is our koan as we pucker.

"But, what are you going to do with Fay Rae, you big, silly ape?"

"Dante had Beatrice, as he heaven-ward aspired, and I have Fay."

"Less straw and more bricks!" Pharaoh grumbles, "and no goldbricking!"

"Gold bricks! That's it! Most of the bricks are clay, but a few are golden. Fay, keep your eyes pealed."

Fay screams, "You filthy beast, hugging this building, kissing bricks, furtively peeking up my skirt."



They are approachng now a lengthy brick improvisation, a Victorian paraphrase of what once, long ago, resulted in Gothic Cathedrals - but which, in its own time, arose not from any need to climb through the fashioning of suitable confusions toward any apical God, but more in a derangement of aim, a doubt as to the God's actual locus (or, in some, as to its very existence), out of a cruel network of sensuous moments that could not be transcended and so bent the intentions of the builders not on any zenith, but back to fright, to simple escape, in whatever direction, from what the industrial smoke, street excrement, windowless warrens, shrugging leather forests of drive belts, flowing and patient shadow states of the rats and flies, were saying about the chances for mercy that year."
- Page 46



Here comes another brick, pucker up!



... they have waddled in awkward pilgrimage to this assembly: to be sanctified, taken in... 'For as much as they are the creatures of God, and have the gift of rational discourse, acknowledging that only in His Word is eternal life to be found' ... And there are tears of happiness in the eyes of the dodoes. They are all brothers now, they and the humans who
used to hunt them, brothers in Christ,

....


Sanctified now they will feed us, sanctified their remains and droppings fertilize our crops. Did we tell them 'Salvation'? Did we mean a dwelling forever in the City? Everlasting life? An earthly paradise restored, their island as it used to be given them back? Probably. Thinking all the time of the little brothers numbered among our own blessings. Indeed, if they save us from hunger in this world, then beyond, in Christ's kingdom, our salvations must be, in like measure, inextricable. Otherwise the dodoes would be only what they appear as in the world's illusory light - - only our prey. God could not be that cruel.

- Page 111






... like light at the edge of the evening when, for perhaps a perilous ten minutes, nothing helps: put on your glasses and light lamps, sit by the west window and still it keeps going away, you keep losing the light and perhaps it is forever this time ... a good time of day for learning surrender, learning to diminish like the light, or like certain music. This surrender is his only gift. Afterward he can recall nothing. Sometimes, rarely, there may be tantalizing - not words, but halos of meaning around words his mouth evidently spoke, that only stay behind -- if they do -- for a moment, like dreams, can't be held or developed, and, presently, go away.
- Page 145




Fallen sparks. Fragments of vessels broken at the Creation. And someday, somehow, before the end, a gathering back to home. A messsenger from the Kingdom, arriving at the last moment, But I tell you there is no such message, no such home --- only the millions of last moments ... no more. Our history is an aggregate of last moments.
- Page 149

[ihrocks]

This is a favorite of mine. I hope you enjoy it. :)

[Sitaram]

(Sitaram removes his King Kong costume and puts down the Fay Wray doll)

It's only me.

Here is a readers guide of footnotes to "Gravity's Rainbow"

http://www.english.mnsu.edu/larsson/grnotes.html

and this Pynchon site is pretty amazing

http://www.hyperarts.com/pynchon/index.html



Pynchon on The Simpsons, Again!
On Sunday, February 20 (8:00-8:30 PM ET/PT), the official 16th season premiere of THE SIMPSONS was aired, whereon actor James Caan and writer Thomas Pynchon guest-starred as themselves.


Thomas Pynchon has written a 20 page introduction to a new edition of George Orwell's "1984"
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/05/03/DD302378.DTL&type=printable


http://www.hyperarts.com/pynchon/newbies.html



One must be reminded that beneath the wide-ranging erudition and complexity there beats a rock 'n' roll heart, and the daunting mystery and "high seriousness" is counterbalanced by flights of zany (and often quite dark) humor. And, of course, there is simply the sheer beauty and breathtaking power of the writing, the subtly interwoven plots and themes, the rich detail and, as Penny Padgett (who helps maintain the Thomas Pynchon Home Page) put it, "the way you can find something amazing on just about every page, the way these amazing things have a way of connecting to each other, giving you that 'aha!' experience every time you look closer."


Join the Pynchon E-mail list-serve group, if you like, and then, send them posts with links to this site, and then, we will have them coming here (possibly)

http://www.waste.org/pynchon-l/

[Sitaram]

I am studying these passages this morning, as I sip my coffee.

"Chances of mercy" - page 46

"Halos of meaning" - page 145

One farmer will say to another "what is the chance of rain?"

The phrase "chances of mercy" has a halo of sorts in a native speaker's mind.

But, when is mercy like rain?

And what is rain's halo?

I have some suspicions.

In Islam, rain is associated with mercy.

http://www.alinaam.org.za/dhadith/asunnah3.htm

http://www.soundvision.com/shop/pview.asp?Item=7406-001


Milan Kundera says that critics are people who "discover" other peoples discoveries. He makes them sound like scavangers picking apart dead bodies of works. Well, even vultures have to eat. A vulture has a bald head because it is always sticking its head in carcasses, and feathers would become matted with gore. A vulture is also, supposedly, the only bird with a sense of smell, to smell the carrion, or to smell approaching death, as it circles above.

Sitaram changes from his gorilla costume to his vulture costume.

http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/1501.html



The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That, in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy. I have spoke thus much
To mitigate the justice of thy plea;
Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence 'gainst the merchant there.



It is in the Old Testament that we find rain and words and mercy conjoined:



For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: KJV


So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.




Humanity is God's critics (are we not).

We do not see ourselves as vultures, but rather, eagles, nobler scavangers.


http://www.precious-testimonies.com/Hope_Encouragement/LivingWaters/eagles/eagles.htm

For wheresoever the carcass (his body...his disciples) is, there will the eagles be gathered together". (Matthew 24:27-28).

Now, the rainbow was the sign of the first covenant, shown to Noah after the flood, symbolizing the vow God made to never again attempt to destroy the human race.

In the days of Noah, there was no hint that one day, human technology would develop the gothic sophistication to do the job of annihilation with no assistance from God.

[Sitaram]

The mysterious woman


... who was the woman alone in the earth, planted up to her shoulders in the aardvark hole, a gazing head rooted to the desert plane, with an upsweep of mountains far behind her, darkly folded, far away in the evening? She can feel the incredible pressure, miles of horizontal sand and clay, against her belly. Down the trail wait the luminous ghosts of her four stillborn children, fat worms lying with no chances of comfort among the wild onions, one by one, crying for milk more sacred than what is tasted and blessed in the village calabashes. In preterite line they have pointed her here, to be in touch with the Earth's gift for genesis. The woman feels power flood through her every gate: a river between her thighs, light leaping at the ends of finers and toes. It is sure and nourishing as sleep. It is warmth. The more the daylight fades, the further she submits -- to the dark, to the descent of water from the air. She is a seed in the Earth.
- pg 316

[Sitaram]

The sun never sets on the British Empire:




A generation earlier, the declining number of live Herero births was a topic of medical interest throughout southern Africa. The whites looked on as anxiously as they would have at an outbreak of rinderpest among the cattle. How provoking, to watch one's subject population dwindling away like this, year after year. What's a colony without its dusky natives? Where's the fun if they're all going to die off? Just a big hunk of desert, no more maids, no field-hands, no laborers for the construction of the mining -- wait, wait a minute there, yes, it's Karl Marx, that sly old racist skipping away with his teeth together and his eyebrows up trying to make believe it's nothing but Cheap Labor and Overseas Markets....
Oh, no. Colonies are much, much more. Colonies are the outhouses of the European soul, where a fellow can let his pants down and relax, enjoy the smell of his own waste. Where he can fall on his slender prey roaring as loud as he feels like, and guzzle her blood with open joy. Eh? Where he can just wallow and rut and let himself go in a softness, a receptive darkness of limbs, of hair as woolly as the hair on his own forbidden groin. Where the poppy, and cannabis and coca grow full and green, and not to the colors and style of death, as do ergot and agaric, the blight and fungus native to Europe. Christian Europe was always death, Karl, death and repression. Out and down in the colonies, life can be indulged, life and sensuality in all its forms, with no harm done to the Metropolis, nothing to soil those cathedrals, white marble statues, noble thoughts . . . . No word ever gets back. The silences down here are vast enought to absorb all behavior, no matter how dirty, how animal it gets . . . . "

- Page 317

[Sitaram]

A few months ago, before I had seriously considered purchasing the book, I was in a laundromat and saw a middle-aged man reading "Gravity's Rainbow". I asked him how he liked it. He said that he had tried to read it a long time ago, and stopped, but someone at work told him that it is an important novel and he should make another effort and try to read through it.

I saw that same man, yesterday, in the same laundromat, and asked him how he liked the book. He said that he could not finish reading it because it was just too difficult to follow. I told him I was up to almost page 400. He said, "Thats 300 pages further than I got."

We talked for a while about the difficulties of reading the novel, and about novels in general.

I mentioned how interesting it can be to look for symbolism and hidden meaning in certain novels and poems.

He asked me, point blank, if I thought that authors really consciously try to weave symbolic, hidden meaning into their writings. I cited examples of modern authors who did, in my estimation, consciously attempt to achieve an inner, esoteric level of meaning.

He gave me a quizzical look and said, "Well, if most people are unaware of the hidden level of meaning, then it is all for nothing, a wasted effort."

He raises a valid question.

Easter egg hunts can be fun. But suppose there is no such thing as the Easter Bunny, and it's not even Easter. Then what shall we hunt?

If I search google.com on: difficult reading pynchon "gravity's rainbow"

Google returns about 5800 hits.


http://kaedrin.com/fun/books/gravity.html



Yeah, and Moby Dick was about a whale.

Truth be told, Gravity's Rainbow defies any conventional summary, and, indeed, any conventional review. It is often observed that most people don't so much review the contents of the novel as the experience they had in reading it. The focus is often on how long it took to read it, the stigma that is associated with it, or how difficult it is to read. And this is a difficult book. It took me about a year of off-and-on reading to complete it... This is not to say that I did not enjoy it, just that I needed to be in a certain mood to read it. It's one of those books that simply demands an attentive reading, and that was not always possible for me.

Pynchon's prose is extremely complex and convoluted. It snakes around, quickly and deftly tackling various subjects without staying in one place for very long at a time. It's mindnumbingly dense, peppered with words, concepts, and ideas that are vague and esoteric. One of the things I enjoyed most was picking through the elaborate text, researching and cataloging the interesting passages or historical references that salt Pynchon's text. Depending on how you approach the novel, a passing familiarity with the many subjects that Pynchon mentions (such as Pavlovian psychology, Qabalah, or German history between world wars) might be rewarding.

….

Again, this can all be somewhat daunting. There are times when it just gets to be too much and it seems like the text is absolutely nonsensical. I had a lot of trouble towards the beginning of the novel, I think, because I was straining to make too much sense of everything. I eventually gave up and started just letting the novel be, and I suddenly found it taking shape. That, to me, was the secret to reading this novel.

….

However, I never could quite shake the feeling that this novel is mostly style and little story, and thus I can't quite bring myself to give the highest rating I can. In terms of style, it is hands down the best thing I've ever read, if a little difficult. Reading something right after you've read Gravity's Rainbow is interesting, because nearly everything seems so simplistic. But style for the sake of style doesn't quite cut it. Still, I rate it extremely high because it truly is an achievement and I believe Pynchon accomplished whatever it was he sought out to do with this novel.



http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=Gravity's%20Rainbow




Either you LOVE this novel or you don't get it. There's no middle ground.
Like many great books, Gravity's Rainbow provides a reading experience a bit similar to taking an LSD trip (or living appx. 1 day with Attention Deficit Disorder): you suddenly discover dimensions of everything that weren't visible before, and for that matter, you suddenly discover that everything has more dimensions than you thought were possible... in fact, more dimensions than you can imagine.

Byron the Bulb's story can be taken as...
* a treatise on planned obsolescence, but with the bizarre element of the product planned for obsolescence being an individual, a ghost in the machine. But it's more poignant (chilling?) than that: the Bulb is, despite its immortality, powerless -- this kind of reminds me of Terry Gilliam's Brazil.
* a reflection of the anthropomorphized bulbs appearing in head comics of the period (this is not as ludicrous as it sounds when you consider the eery resemblance between "The Counterforce" and hero teams like the Fantastic Four... hell, the Counterforce even had a Plastic Man.)
* the symbology of light bulbs as ideas (keep in mind that Byron hovers over the heads of several characters in the book). There could even be a hint of guardian angels or of halos, though considering that BtB hovers over a deadly amphetamine-addled barber, this would take some explaining.
I will leave the discovery of other connotations and connections as an exercise for the reader.






• How does technology affect the world in Gravity's Rainbow? Like Frankenstein's monster, will our technological innovations lead to our undoing? How is nature affected?

• A common theme in literature is nature's indifference to human affairs. Given, however, the massive destructive power that becomes possible by technology, can nature act as a counterbalance to humankind's destructive nature? Should it?

• Is our understanding of science and causality something that we have imposed on reality in order to explain it?

• How does Pynchon's treatment of post-war Europe compare with the historical truth?

• "Each will have his personal Rocket." What's yours?

• Ya ya, symbolism, ya ya themes, what does it all mean? Does it mean anything? Is there a point to the novel at all?

• Is this the triumph of style over substance? Is that a good thing? Can style over substance work at all? Or does the manic style of this novel detract from it's impact?

• Is the novel actually difficult, or am I just whiney?




This page looks most useful

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_gr.html

A biography with a photo of a youthful Pynchon:

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_biography.html



Known in German as Die Enden der Parabel (1981) and in Spanish as El arco iris de la gravedad (1978), GR was created in cavelike rooms. Pynchon's only accessories were a cot, desk, and some homemade bookshelves with piggy banks and a book about swine on them, giving his working space an aura of monkish impermanence. Pynch was a tortured spirit who loved to hear a friend's wife sing a parody of Shirley Temple's "On the Good Ship Lollipop." The MS of the Masterwork was written in tiny script on engineer's quadrille paper. On one shelf, there was a model rocket constructed like one of Picasso's found objects -- a pencil-type eraser with a peelable corkscrew wrapper, a needle in its nose, and a launch pad made from a reformed paper clip. (Most of the information about this period of Pynchon's life can be found in Jules Siegel's seminal article "Who Is Thomas Pynchon . . . And Why Is He Taking Off With My Wife?", originally published in Playboy, March, 1977). The rocket waited, silently, to blast off into realms of speed, light, and distance so far removed from our ordinary experience that we might be led through them, past the Qlippoth, walking shells of the Dead, to the Other Side -- to the Source of Meaning itself. . . . Or, we might not.

For Pynchon must by needs remain forever elusive, the Faceless One in every sense. Like his characters, we search, search, and search some more. Perhaps for him, perhaps forever. . . .


Here is an excellent essay to help the first time reader prepare for Gravity's Rainbow

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_grintro.html

[Scheherazade]

He gave me a quizzical look and said, "Well, if most people are unaware of the hidden level of meaning, then it is all for nothing, a wasted effort."

He raises a valid question.

Easter egg hunts can be fun. But suppose there is no such thing as the Easter Bunny, and it's not even Easter. Then what shall we hunt?I think the analogy here would be not the inexistence of Easter bunny or Easter; it would be "what if we hide those Easter eggs so well that no one is able to find them?" Then, it is a wasted effort (if they are not found) and beats the purpose of hiding eggs.

And if there is no bunny, no Easter? I think inexistence of Easter bunny and Easter itself is preferable to too well-hidden eggs. Then we can sit and relax; take a day off from googling...

[Sitaram]

I do intend, in the coming hours and days, to make some useful reply to Scheherazade's post.

In preparation for that future event, I did a google.com search on "DILLIGAD", rather expecting some exotic and obscure heroine from the Epic of Gilgamesh. Google tells me that this stands for "Do I look like I give a darn." I am unfamiliar with the expression. I must say, that is not what I was expecting to find.

Anyway, after a search on "Dilligad", I decided to look for the plot synopsis of the Simpson's episode in which Pynchon plays his own voice.

So, here, for your browsing pleasure, without further ado, is the link:

http://amysrobot.com/archives/2004/01/the_history_of.php

-------------------------------------------

Well, now, as I resume this post, it is Monday evening, after work, and I have had some time during the day to collect my thoughts.

In order for anyone to understand my thinking about what we have playfully called the "Easter egg hunt" in fiction, it will be helpful to read through my two College essays, written in the late 1960s, which is when I began to consider such questions very seriously.

My Sophomore essay, "A Method and It's Practical Application" is here:

http://toosmallforsupernova.org/method.htm

and shortly, I shall add a link to the second, Junior essay,
"Prolegomenon to the Writing of an Essay or Thesis upon a Work of Art"

http://toosmallforsupernova.org/prolegommena.htm


If you actually muster the time and interest to read through both essays, then you may as well read

"Isaac Newton's Homework"

http://toosmallforsupernova.org/page009.htm

which will vividly illustrate for you one major problem which we will be forced to face in our discourse on "Easter egg hunts."


Also.... see this other thread on Pynchon

http://online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?p=8097

[Sitaram]

http://online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?p=97658

Here is another Pynchon thread

[mono]

I think, by now, these two threads have finally influenced me to read Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow. I intend on doing some book shopping soon anyway, so maybe I will toss it in my little basket. :D
Thanks for bringing back this thread, Sitaram.

[Sitaram]

Since I recently learned how to embed an image into a post, I thought it would be worthwhile to show, in the previous post, a picture of Remedios Varo's painting, "Embroidering Earth's Mantle", which forms the foundation of Pynchon's "metaphor" in "The Crying of Lot 49".

I entitle this post "The Other Side of the Coin" because of something shocking that one critic pointed out about the passage in "The Crying of Lot 49" which describes Remdios Varo's painting. That critic speculates that what seems to be the most beautiful of all metaphors is a red herring which Pynchon throws to the readers, as if they were a pack of hunting hounds, to send them on a false trail of symbolic analysis, and then laugh at them as they scamper off into the underbrush.

[Redshift]

What's everyone's stance on Pynchon? He is, for me, one of if not the greatest living author, and I utterly subscribe to his 'why should things be easy to understand' theory. For those of you who haven't read him, I implore you to start with Vineland.

Oh, hi. I'm new, I'm Redshift. And I like Thomas Pynchon.

[Bandini]

Love that title! My mate keeps telling me to read 'Gravity's Rainbow' - I will one day. Reckon I'll get the companion to read alongside it.

Ay up lad.

[Redshift]

Gravity's Rainbow is like having a huge brick of awesome shoved in your brain, but I definetly wouldn't start with it (Pynchon's ouvre is hardly mammoth - 4 novels, one novella, one short story collection), not only because some characters are introduced in other novels, but also because the rest will seem anti-climactic.

[beer good]

I love Pynchon, though I have a feeling I might need to re-read him before I go into much more detail than that. He does tend to make your head spin, but he's a brilliant writer. I think he's one of few living novelists who can actually claim to do something entirely different. Plus, he's been on the Simpsons with a bag over his head, how can you not love that.


Difficult? Schmifficult!

[Redshift]

Been on it twice, amazingly.

[beer good]

And on one of them he had a sign next to him saying "Have your picture taken with famous reclusive author". One of those jokes that only people who are into Pynchon (or at least have read a bit about him) will get.

I think my favourite is probably "Mason & Dixon", actually. Though all four of his big novels blew my mind - quite possibly literally.

[Redshift]

"Hey kid. Kid, over here. You like Pynchon huh? You tried any of this David Foster-Wallace? It'll blow your mind."

[Unspar]

Redshift, I dig your style. Pynchon rules, but I'm gonna cop out and say Crying of Lot 49 was my favorite (though I've only read that, Gravity's Rainbow, and V). Of all his paranoid odysseys, I felt the most paranoid reading that one.

[Jarndyce]

I'll grudgingly admit that I have Gravity and it's companion on my bedside table, one-third completed, and that I started it almost two years ago. I do have a solid excuse for not completing it, however. My wife and I had our first child two months ago. Gravity's Rainbow isn't quite the thing to try to read when you are distracted and get no sleep.

Crying of Lot 49 is fantastic, and for those Radiohead fans out there, the name of their mailing list/website/shop is w.a.s.t.e. You've just gotta love that.

[EAP]

Redshift,

are you a Garner fan?


On Topic:

Started Gravity's Rainbow and found it to be waste of time.

[kimpossible]

First Question: Have you read it?

First Comment: Gravity's Rainbow = Supreme Confusion

Is that the same for everyone? I find it much more difficult to follow than the Crying of Lot 49 (possibly because it is eight times as long). But don't get me wrong, I enjoy every page of it and it has made me LOL (for real).

Now, the real reason for this thread. Am I alone in my confusion? Do you have any suggestions as to how I should go about reading this novel?

I would like to have a nice discussion and would appreciate any comments.

[Jarndyce]

There is a great guide for Rainbow called "Gravity's Rainbow" Companion: Sources and Contexts for Pynchon's Novel by Steven C. Weisenburger. It gives you exactly what the title says, sources, contexts, tidbits, themes, etc., to try to help out with the masses of allusions and images piled into every sentence. There are other guides out there, but this one is the best, in my opinion.

[kimpossible]

much appreciated.... will check out....

[Lambert]

I'm starting to read three works of Thomas Pynchon starting with The Crying Of Lot 49, then V. and finally *drum roll* Gravity's Rainbow.

What do people who have read his novels think of his work?

[grace86]

Wow. My father has read all of those works. I think Lot 49 is the shortest isn't it? He said those were among the harder works of literature to understand, and I have not picked them up yet. Once you finish, you gain a lot of insight. Of those three I was going to start with Gravity's Rainbow. Make sure you have plenty of time and let us know what you think as you finish them. Good luck and welcome.

[Big Al]

Hey, I'm trying to get into the works of Thomas Pynchon, and I was wondering if anybody could help me out. What's his best novel, or better yet, what would be a good starting place?

[Egil Skallagrim]

start with V, since it's his first. Most people recommend Gravity's Rainbow as his best, however.

For myself, I find him average. I think he gets caught in the mid-century attempt to be slightly wacky for a straight-laced crowd, however. Conservative eccentricity, is maybe the best way to say it.

[Whifflingpin]

I've read "Mason & Dixon," about, er, Mason & Dixon. I don't remember it as whacky, in any way, just a good yarn and character and historical study.

I keep meaning to re-read it alongside Patrick White's "Voss."

Anyway, it is perfectly readable, and would do well as a first Pynchon to read.

.

.

[Maida]

I would recommend Gravity's Rainbow, it's definitely my favorite!

[s_fenella]

I just don't get what Pynchon is trying to tell the readers. He is way too sophhisticated that he made me feel unintellectuel about myself. What is going on in his "The Crying of Lot 49"? Why is Oedipa looking for those clues? And what is she really looking for? What is the Trystero, and the W.A.S.T.E system? What is going on?

I just don't get what Pynchon is trying to tell the readers. He is way too sophhisticated that he made me feel unintellectuel about myself. What is going on in his "The Crying of Lot 49"? Why is Oedipa looking for those clues? And what is she really looking for? What is the Trystero, and the W.A.S.T.E system? What is going on?

I just don't get what Pynchon is trying to tell the readers. He is way too sophhisticated that he made me feel unintellectuel about myself. What is going on in his "The Crying of Lot 49"? Why is Oedipa looking for those clues? And what is she really looking for? What is the Trystero, and the W.A.S.T.E system? What is going on?

i think that Thomas Pynchon is "out there", which means that he is too smart and his work is too hard for me to comprehend. What do you think about his "The Crying of Lot 49"? Learnt anything from it? Figured put what the whole book is about? I don't.

[bugmasta]

I have to agree. I read "The Crying of Lot 49" also and I feel like I must have missed a lot. Though, I must say I have never read anothe book that dealt with underground postal systems.


Gravity's Rainbow is like having a huge brick of awesome shoved in your brain

That's great! I'm going to have to not only read the book but use that phrase sometime. I've read Lot 49, hopefully I'll catch more of what is going on in this "Gravity's Rainbow".

[s_fenella]

it is a very interesting topic. i mean, the postal system and all those mysteries. BUT...it seems like a whole bunch of nonsense to me. And it really wears me out. To think that it would be on my finals...OMG!!!

[rob91]

What are your thoughts on this? I'm about 75 pages in, and I'm still not sure what I'm reading. I'm not looking for any answers to what it's about (if there are any), but just overall, what's the reading experience like? Does it get any more understandable as it goes on?

Thanks.

[tudwell]

Ooooh, Gravity's Rainbow. One of my favorites. You ask what it's about. The overarching plot is Slothrop's search for the Rocket-00000, but there are lots of characters and sub-plots thrown in between. The reading experience is, well, it's probably different for everyone else, but the whole thing is surreal. Sometimes it feel like the pages are soaked in acid. It's very strange, but in a good way.

Does it get more understandable? I'd say no. There were only a few scenes that truly baffled me. The rest sometimes felt disjointed and sometimes only vaguely related. But as a whole I definitely love the book. It's got some great great writing, hilarious hijinks, musical intrusions, and the myriad ideas put forth in the novel are very thought provoking. Although I don't think you'll come to a consensus as to what the book is "about" and just what all of those "thought provoking ideas" are.

[rob91]

thanks tud. I think this is going to be quite an experience....

[Babbalanja]

Gravity's Rainbow was the first Pynchon I ever read, and it really changed the way I think about literature. I really appreciated its erudition, its prose poetry, and its humor. The Slothrop saga, and WWII, was just a framework for all the weird digressions and narrative exploration.

I think V. is probably Pynchon's finest novel, but I haven't read Against the Day yet.

[metal134]

I haven't read it yet, but I own it and it is on my reading list.

[SirJazzHands]

Like.. there is something about V. and what little I've read of Gravity's Rainbow that kind of grabs me. Even if sometimes he references things I don't really comprehend, you get the general gist of it and he manages to say things in ways most people don't while still sounding human.

[B-Mental]

read the entire Gravity's Rainbow and repeat that statement with the same enthusiasm...I liked it at the begining, but by the end of the book I couldn't wait to put it down...right around the part with the german in the shack across the channel.

[Lambert]

Read V., The Crying of Lot 49, Gravity's Rainbow, Vineland, Mason & Dixon and about 400 pages of Against the Day so far.

The only one I disliked was Vineland which was just too sentimental.

If you want to see some of his influences you should bits of this page: http://www.pynchon.pomona.edu/bio/influences.html

[nathank]

Yeah, sometimes it is amazing! Even years later I still get images popping into my mind from most of his books. The writing is great, even if it means getting lost at times. I'm working on Mason and Dixon for the first time right now and I have so far found it to be outstanding. It just seems the most satisfying of the books I've read so far (COL49, V, GR), perhaps because it doesn't seem to push the experimental envelope as much as GR did (or maybe it's just #4 in my Pynchon journey).

Enjoy!

[ClickForth]

okokok

[stately,plump]

That's a great quote, clickforth. Pynchon's writing has never really resonated with me for some reason, though I've never finished Gravity's Rainbow. "Crying of Lot" was a bit too jagged and smarmy for me, but then again I haven't read the book in like 10 years.

[Rogers_68]

About a year ago I tried Gravity's Rainbow. I gave it about 100 pages and then gave it up, feeling like it is way over my head. A couple of weeks ago I started reading about V. I got intrigued and decided to give it a try, this time relaxing a little more and just enjoying his use of sentences instead of over-analyzing every little detail. So far I'm really enjoying it (I've read to about page 120-something). Should I give GR a try again? Have I learned how to read Pynchon or are the 2 books just dramatically different works?

[HotKarl]

I'm surprised you started with V. and Gravity's Rainbow seeing as most people start with The Crying of Lot 49. That's the only Pynchon book I've read. And while I loved it, I just don't see myself sitting down for the 700 page behemoths Mr. P loves to write. But about the over analysis you mentioned: I can't imagine reading Pynchon any other way. With his themes of entropy, it seems like the more you read, the less you know, so inevitably I ended up reading paragraphs over and over, scouring the text for clues. But, when you do find clues, they just provoke more questions. I'd keep reading Pynchon only if you don't have any beef with super analytical reading.

[vheissu]

I read V. first, took me forever to finish it (mainly due to studies), though it was definetely worthwhile. Then I opened Gravity's Rainbow. And at exactly 30 pages after closed it. It made absolutely no sense and I haven't tried it again. I'd suggest you go for Crying of lot 49[/] and just leave [I]GR for a while...

[Rogers_68]

Vonnegut has always tempted me. Is Slaughterhouse Five a good place to start?

I didn't like it at all but I did like Player Piano.

[Rogers_68]

Still love the guy's writing regardless of the lucidity of the novels or even of Pynchon himself.

His distinct way of putting sentences together and of incorporating colons is entertaining, even funny sometimes.

[biglog]

I just finished up COL49 and would love to compare notes/ideas with others who have done close readings. I'm new here so I don't totally know the protocol, but I spent all day deconstructing this book and am dying to chat about it. I'm really hoping for some input. Obviously there are a lot of directions this could go, but perhaps we could start pretty broad and work our way down. My take is that Pynchon acknowledges the appearance of synchronicity (Jung's acausal connector) behind seemingly random coincidences, but demonstrates that any "meaning" is purely subjective and relative. It's all a matter of perception. Behind the hieroglyphic streets there's either "transcendental meaning, or only the earth". It all depends on how you're looking at it. But with whatever reality we choose to accept, we also accept the consequences. The deeper Oedipa digs into the Tristero mystery, and the more coincidences pile up, the further she paints herself into the middle of a web of her own imagination/creation. But, like Triblette says, our reality is in our own head. We are like projectors at the planetarium, projecting our reality onto the world. One could interpret any of the dozens of coincidences in the novel as simply that - coincidences. Like Metzger's Baby Igor film, or the bones in the lake, or the black marauders, history is full of "endless repetitions" (although there is always the chance that the reels get screwed up). Where Oedipa begins to part ways with sanity is when she feels compelled to arbitrarily invest the world with Meaning (to "create constellations"), and she imagines herself the target of a vast, clandestine consipiracy. She trusts no one, and no one is above suspicion. Paranoia sets in. But that is the way her understanding of all the events "fitted, logically, together", as if "there were revelation in progress around her". Who is there to prove her wrong? There is no objective basis for interpreting the endless string of coincidences. To paraphrase Triblette, you can waste your life gathering clues and developing theses and never touch the truth. By the time we get to the conclusion of the novel and we are on the brink of finding out who, potentially, is behind all of this... it no longer really matters. Pynchon's point has already been made, and the mystery figure is rendered arbitrary.

Speaking of the "endless repetitions", I love the convuluted relationship between Manni Di Presso and Metzger. Di Presso is a former lawyer who has become an actor, playing the lead in a pilot based on his acquaintance Metzger, an actor who has become a lawyer (and sometimes acts). But as Metzger says, "a lawyer in a courtroom, in front of a jury, becomes an actor". Di Presso's pilot isn't going to get picked up unless Metzger does something fantastic, like defend the estate of Pierce Inverarity against the charges that he, Manni Di Presso, is bringing against it. So, in summation, we have Di Presso, a lawyer-turned-actor-turned-lawyer (which is acting), playing Metzger, an actor-turned-lawyer (who sometimes acts), in a role in which he, Di Presso-as-Metzger defends his client against charges that he, Di Presso in real life, is bringing against Metzger, the man whom he is portraying. So what if, hypothetically, the pilot becomes a success, and they do a spin-off based on Di Presso, and... oh, forget it.

[Oomoo]

I feel COL49 is fairly straightforward. The coincidences are not actual coincidences; Oedipa's troubled mind makes the endless string of events seem like they are, but none of them are of actual significance, and the ones that are (the cigarettes conspiracy) are forgotten in the salad of infinite information. She becomes alienated and paranoid - culminating in her loneliness in the gay bar, with Metzger becoming a drug addict and her psychotherapist going mad - in her search after a transcendental signified which does not really exist. It is somewhat cliched in an anlysis of this book to say it is a parody of detective novels but it definitely functions like one. Information in the post modern age doesn't really give us broader understanding - it only makes us know less. Thus things are pretty clear in the begining for us - just like for Oedipa - and get increasingly complicated to the point where reality and fantasy are indistinguishable, and instead of having everything cleared up in the ending we are simply left to wonder.

[HotKarl]

I feel COL49 is fairly straightforward. The coincidences are not actual coincidences; Oedipa's troubled mind makes the endless string of events seem like they are, but none of them are of actual significance, and the ones that are (the cigarettes conspiracy) are forgotten in the salad of infinite information. She becomes alienated and paranoid - culminating in her loneliness in the gay bar, with Metzger becoming a drug addict and her psychotherapist going mad - in her search after a transcendental signified which does not really exist. It is somewhat cliched in an anlysis of this book to say it is a parody of detective novels but it definitely functions like one. Information in the post modern age doesn't really give us broader understanding - it only makes us know less. Thus things are pretty clear in the begining for us - just like for Oedipa - and get increasingly complicated to the point where reality and fantasy are indistinguishable, and instead of having everything cleared up in the ending we are simply left to wonder.

Heyyyyyyyy. Someone has a good understanding of the novel.

[Hank Stamper]

read crying of lot 49 a while a go and read V over Easter... I quite enjoyed it but found the constant jumping around of the narrative pretty tiresome at times and it took me a while to finish it... I have Gravity's Rainbow on the shelf but V has put me off a bit... How will GR compare to V?

[lowradiation]

I just finished The Crying Of Lot 49, started small with Pynchon, finished it in 24 hours I loved it that much. Thought it was brilliant.

Now I know it's gonna get bigger with his novels, but I'm stepping up to V, bought my copy yesterday.