V. by Thomas Pynchon: Online Guides?

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Does anyone know of a good, free, online chapter-by-chapter summary for V.? I love to use the guides on sites like Sparknotee. I really only use the chapter summaries as I go along just to make sure I'm on track with what's happening. I rarely look at the commentary/interpretations of a novel until I have finished, because I like doing that part myself, but for such intricate and complex prose, I always just check and make sure what I think is going on is actually what's going on. I've looked all over the place and can't find any straight chapter-by-chapter summaries (which I always read after said chapters), so maybe someone else knows of something I couldn't find.

[Lulim]

I don't know if you already checked this out: Thomas Pynchon Wiki (http://v.pynchonwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page#Page_by_Page_Annotations ).

[Modest Proposal]

Wikipedia often has summaries.

[dfloyd]

circa 1971. At first it was confusing to me - going back and forth from the spy V. playing the great game to the hunting for albino alligators in the sewers of New York - but I did get through it without too much trouble. I think it is one of Pychnon's best because it is not of incredible length like some of his other novels. Pynchon and authors like DeLilo are not good enough to spend hours upon. I will read and have read some very long novels : Les Miserables, War and Peace, Anna Karenina, etc. but Pynchon and Delilo will be forgotten when the aforementioned are still being read. My point is that if you can find chapter summaries of V., fine. But you can get through it without them. I read a very good synopsis of The Leopard recently on Wikipedia so you might find one there.

I found it interesting that Pynchon took a course from Nabokov when the Russian was teaching. Nabokov said he didn't remember Pynchon.

[Modest Proposal]

circa 1971. At first it was confusing to me - going back and forth from the spy V. playing the great game to the hunting for albino alligators in the sewers of New York - but I did get through it without too much trouble. I think it is one of Pychnon's best because it is not of incredible length like some of his other novels. Pynchon and authors like DeLilo are not good enough to spend hours upon. I will read and have read some very long novels : Les Miserables, War and Peace, Anna Karenina, etc. but Pynchon and Delilo will be forgotten when the aforementioned are still being read. My point is that if you can find chapter summaries of V., fine. But you can get through it without them. I read a very good synopsis of The Leopard recently on Wikipedia so you might find one there.

I found it interesting that Pynchon took a course from Nabokov when the Russian was teaching. Nabokov said he didn't remember Pynchon.

dfloyd, if, like myself, you are not completely enthralled with Delilo and Pynchon--I know from many posts you are not--you may try "The Crying of Lot 49" and "White Noise" as they are both short, and in my opinion, excellent texts.

[Babbalanja]

dfloyd, if, like myself, you are not completely enthralled with Delilo and Pynchon--I know from many posts you are not--you may try "The Crying of Lot 49" and "White Noise" as they are both short, and in my opinion, excellent texts.I've only read Delillo's first novel, Americana, and really enjoyed it. I have yet to read Underworld, which I'm told is excellent.

However, I love Pynchon, and I echo MP's suggestion: Crying of Lot 49 is the briefest of Pynchon's novels, but it has all the hallmarks of his genius: wordplay, flights of fancy, philosophical slapstick, and hilarious paranoia.

Regards,

Istvan

[dfloyd]

my time is so tied up reading Herodotus, The History of the Peloponnesian War, The French Revolution, The Discovery and Conquest of Mexico,
the Leopard (second reading), Anna Karenina (second reading), and Uncle Wigilly in Conecticut (first reading) that I have no time available in the near future.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I'll probably just look up a summary when I'm finished. I seem to be getting it pretty good right now, though I'll suspect Gravity's Rainbow will be much more difficult.

[Bastable]

I found it interesting that Pynchon took a course from Nabokov when the Russian was teaching. Nabokov said he didn't remember Pynchon.

I love that little story, it brings a smile to my face every time I hear it. But I wonder if it is just because Pynchon defeated me (with Gravity's Rainbow) and it's bitter resentment, squashed with lines like "Pynchon is overrated" "He is a lesser writer" "He will be forgotten", coming to the surface?