TRP/Sexism/Film

[Andrew Dinn]

Alec W Mchoul writes:

[re `Pynchon's sexism']

> To which I have to say, after several investigations of TRP's sexual 
> politics (pre- and post- his admissions to sexism in the Intro to _SL_), 
> Basil is right: Altman wouldn't be sexist _enough_.

When you say `Pynchon's sexism' I take it you mean the sexist
presumptions one can identify in his writing (hence the scare quotes),
inferences about the man himself being (arguably) somewhat academic -
or maybe you know different?

Anyway, I write because I reread your essay on Vineland last night and
recall your comments on Prairie's pilfered bag of underwear and her
speculations concerning Zoyd's interest in aforesaid underwear as
modelled by Prairie herself. You seemed to be suggesting that Pynchon
puts this stuff in either i) (just) because he gets off on it or ii)
because he fails to recognise that it is a male fantasy out of kilter
with the reality of female behaviour - Pynchon does not know any
better. I don't buy the 1st one (with or without the just) and
although I believe that Pynchon's women don't necessarily connect with
reality I don't think the misrepresentation is so crass as suggested
above. The characters may indeed conform to or act out sexist roles
but is this a consequence of sexist presumption or is it deliberate
use of cliched behaviour for particular effect. I think there is
evidence of both.

I'd like to hear more about what *you* mean by `Pynchon's sexism'.
Would you accept either of the readings I have give above or did you
mean something else? Personally, I don't think the underwear scene is
necessarily sexist. The fact that it portrays a young girl perceiving
and responding uncritically to her father's weakness for a common male
sexual fantasy is maybe contrived, if not to say unlikely (although,
then again, many men and women do conform uncritically to the fantasy
roles expected of them, including sexual fantasies, and it does start
at a very early age - what age do girls don make-up, wear clothes
whose fashion owes more to fetish than aesthetic concerns, become
obsessed with features, shape, fat etc. [I have `nieces' of 9 and 6
who are already reacting to these pressures!] and are all young girls
unaware of sexual interest and sexual fetishism in adult males, do
they never accomodate uncritically it into their expectations of the
opposite sex and how to respond to them?)  but I did not see anything
condoning or reinforcing this fantasy, beyond it's mere depiction that
is (do you regard this in itself as the problem?). And it's written in
a context (Prairie's friend being sexually abused by her father) where
it cannot easily be regarded uncritically by anyone with the least
savvy and humanity. So what's the charge?


Andrew Dinn
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there is no map / and a compass / wouldn't help at all