My first post to the group, hi

[mndailey at eos.ncsu.edu]

Hey folks,

I hope I'm getting through. Gilbert just signed me on a couple
of days ago and I haven't gotten anything, so either I don't exist,
you don't exist, or it's a slowdown in the group, so to introduce
myself and to invigorate discussion (!) I'll raise a couple of
easygoing points that I've been thinking about.

First, someone please explain to me how to get to Postmodern Journal.
I'm kinda new to this electronic stuff and need a little guidance.

Second,  Richard Farina.  _GR_ was dedicated to him.  He and Pynchon
went to college together.  And Farina's book is very similar, I believe,
to _V_ (the Whole Sick Crew in particular).  So, what's going on here.
Who influenced who?  Does it matter?  I just think that _Been Down
So Long_ doesn't get a fair shake.  It's an excellent book.  Some of the
most exciting writing I've ever read.  I'd just like to know what others'
may think of the joint influence (a pun!).

Third, did ya here the one about bad songwriters?  No?  Here it is.
Who is the only person who writes worse song lyrics than Thomas Pynchon?
Bob Dylan you guess?  No.  Sir Philip Sidney!  Ha-ha.

Fourth,  intricate gristle for your beef.  I went to a rhetoric teacher  
on campus who's big on Pynchon hoping to discuss some aspects of religion
in _GR_ and mostly _Vineland_.  Our conversation couldn't get past 
discussing the various paths an academic can take riding Pynchon's back, so
it got me to thinking, what is there to this litcrit and Pynchon?  I'm a
political science student myself, fairly stupid when it comes to that stuff,
so I spoke to my older brother, a writer and Pynchon devotee (his claim
to fame is a dummy/copyeditor's copy of _Vineland_ that he got from the
English publisher), and he was saying that it is a fairly popular belief
with British critics that Pynchon acrimoniously set litcrit booby traps
throughout his books as some mean-spiritted trick against (what he thought)
the nihilism of modern literary theoreticians and the academics that follow
in tow.  This was very interesting and related to my interest in religion.
It does seem to me-- I've tried reading some crit-- that the true messages
in Pynchon have been obscured by the noise of postmodernist theories.  I
think there are some very basic ideas behind the novels, for instance,
the "family values" routine in _Vineland_ as Zoyd tries to reconquer his
house after the DEA took it.  The fear of death and confrontation with God
and the desperate measures the characters go to avoid facing such things.
I can flush it out much more if anyone cares.  Just let me say that I
believe there is some truth in the booby trap theory. Pynchon knows his
theory in and out and can play with them.  If this is true, and I've
since went back to the rhetoric prof. who got confused, perhaps a
little insulted at the insinuation that all his Phd collegues were
being duped quite methodically, than it is a remarkable development
in the quest to comprehend Pynchon.  Could people accept the great
postmodernist god to be a very devout Roman Catholic or a Buddhist or
whetever meld the man creates for himself?  

Anyway, I hope people are getting this.  If so, help me out.  Tell
me I'm a goof but relay what you think of anything I've raised.

--Alex

"Secret Integration" should be filmed by Steven Spielberg in
                     the classic "Explorers" suburban style.


"I have dreams, I can see carloads of negro nazis
 Like Faust with beards, hydrochloric shaved wierds" 
                                --Mark E. Smith of the Fall
                                  in a song called "Cash'n Carry"