there's tweets in Gaddis too, of course; on page 306 reference is made to an (apocryphal?) book titled _Twit Twit Twit_<br><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 1:52 PM, Mark Kohut <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:markekohut@yahoo.com">markekohut@yahoo.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
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<div>Greeaaate f'in quote....Great!</div>
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<div>I am gonna tweet it..presently!</div>
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<b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">From:</span></b> Erik T. Burns <<a href="mailto:eburns@gmail.com" target="_blank">eburns@gmail.com</a>><br></div><b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">To:</span></b> Mark Kohut <<a href="mailto:markekohut@yahoo.com" target="_blank">markekohut@yahoo.com</a>>; pynchon -l <<a href="mailto:pynchon-l@waste.org" target="_blank">pynchon-l@waste.org</a>><br>
<b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Sent:</span></b> Tue, March 22, 2011 9:09:49 AM
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<div class="h5"><br><b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Subject:</span></b> Re: Recognizing The Recognitions<br></div></div></font>
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<div>yes, laugh -- </div>
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<div>"--He said, It makes the present. He said, it must be shared, and being so, makes the present. Laughter."</div>
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<div>(p380)</div>
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<div>This is one of my favorite quotes from _The Recognitions_ and I think central (pivotal!) to Gaddis' concerns. To reduce it to a twitter-sized soundbite: The past is very serious, the future is very serious. In the present, all you can do is laugh.</div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 12:12 PM, Mark Kohut <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:markekohut@yahoo.com" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">markekohut@yahoo.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
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<div>Analytic 'spoiler"..(let's get some of this labeling out of the way, I say): </div>
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<div>To play a big joke on modernism is one of the ways postmodernism is born? </div>
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<div>Therefore, pivot [The Recognitions is a pivotal book?] and laugh? </div>
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<b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">From:</span></b> Erik T. Burns <<a href="mailto:eburns@gmail.com" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">eburns@gmail.com</a>><br><b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">To:</span></b> pynchon -l <<a href="mailto:pynchon-l@waste.org" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">pynchon-l@waste.org</a>><br>
<b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Sent:</span></b> Tue, March 22, 2011 7:37:20 AM<br><b><span style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Subject:</span></b> Re: Recognizing The Recognitions<br></font>
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<div>"The novel began as a much shorter work" <br></div>
<div>Don't they all? ;-)</div>
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<div>I would like to argue that the "amazing erudition" of _The Recognitions_ is in large part a very big joke by WG on modernism, on the Eliotic need to shore fragments against one's ruins, this being the most evident in Gwyon's gusher in Chap 3 where there are pages and pages of references, an attempt to assemble a modern mithraism out of his broad and eccentric reading. What gets me is that Gwyon knows this is mostly mumbo jumbo, to ensure that the priesthood retains mystery, and to ensure that the majority remains "outside the mysteries."</div>
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<div>As impressive and enlightening and fun as scrabbling through these deep piles of references can, as with TRP that should not be the main point of the exercise. </div>
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<div><span><span>I expect we will eventually get into an argument about whether Gaddis is able to create characters that are not flat, in contrast to the typical critique of TRP. I find the characters in The Recognitions to be wonderful, yet often deeply etched stereotypes as Gaddis works his allegory -- but then, as is so often mentioned, The Recognitions is a roman à clef, and many of the characters are real people Gaddis knew (incl Ernest Hemingway and of course Sheri Martinelli; <a href="http://www.williamgaddis.org/recognitions/martinelli/smartinellismoore.shtml" target="_blank">http://www.williamgaddis.org/recognitions/martinelli/smartinellismoore.shtml</a>), so it cuts both ways.</span></span></div>
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<div>I am currently listening to the extraordinary audiobook of _The Recognitions_. Nick Simpson proves that the characters are anything but flat.</div>
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<div>etb </div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 11:13 AM, Mark Kohut <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:markekohut@yahoo.com" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">markekohut@yahoo.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">Gaddis spent seven years writing The Recognitions. The novel began as a much<br>shorter work and as an explicit parody of Goethe’s Faust. During the period in<br>
which Gaddis was writing the novel, he travelled to Mexico, Central America and<br>Europe.<br>Gaddis also found the title for the novel in The Golden Bough as Frazer noted<br>how Goethe’s Faust originally came from the Clementine Recognitions, a<br>
third-century theological tract (See Clementine literature). It was from this<br>point on that Gaddis began to expand the novel. The novel was completed in<br>1949.[3]<br>[edit]<br><br><br><br><br></blockquote></div><br></div>
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