theREcognitionS

[Andrew Dinn]

Zachary Haberer writes:

> ... Right now, however, I'm wondering whether Wyatt has an
> actual character or is Gaddis just exorcising all the medieval.
> arcana someone forced into him as a child-- his description of
> the Jesuits suggests something of the sort.

Whether Wyatt has a character is pretty much incidental to the fact
that he has insight - or perhaps rather outsight, since he sees not
into himself but into things. The book is not titled `The Recognitions'
for nothing. Wyatt automaticaly recognises art, truth, beauty, passion
(in the sense of suffering) where others merely see artifice, fakery,
glamour and a frantic struggle to achieve notoriety. And vice versa.

I think this is what most distinguishes `The Recognitions' from
Pynchon. The notion that there is some sort of gold standard of art,
truth and beauty which through dedication and study the true artist
learns to recognise. I doubt Pynchon would ever commit to any such
notion. Besides, despite the intensity and validity of Gaddis'
cultural polemic (amazingly, he manages to turn the heat up even more
in his later novels) his purpose is always to recommend, either
directly or by implication, an aesthetic standard - when he doesn't
despair of such a task, that is. Pynchon ranges far beyond mere
aesthetics (that is not to downrate Gaddis' achievement, of course).


Andrew Dinn
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O alter Duft aus Maerchenzeit / Berauschest wieder meine Sinne
Ein naerrisch Heer aus Schelmerein / Durchschwirrt die leichte Luft