Language splinter (was Re: Holt PR)

[MASCARO at humnet.ucla.edu]

The tale end of Steely's exchange is revelatory--
>>Its the way the story is told, not the story itself which makes the difference.
>
>This attitude is precisely why we are living in the age of literary
>exhaustion. It's propounded as if it is some new notion, but it's as old as
>Boccaccio. Only Boccaccio told better stories than most of the writers who
>tout this nonsense.
>
>Steely

Oh Steelman, it's much older than Boccaccio!  It's the oldest story there is--that it's 
language after all that makes the difference in the story.  Plots, as old Possum said, are like 
the piece of meat the burglar throws to the dog.  I appreciate the perspective you always 
bring to Pynchon's, and other, literature, but you always seem to want to pretend that the 
language itself is just an inert and transparent vehicle for the *message* and I know you 
are too smart to really believe these things are separable but your gruff old 
Hemingwayesque (Pagliaesque?) public persona always tries to pretend that worrying 
about the language is sissy-boy stuff and the real f****** meat is in the socio-political 
dimensions of the , you know, story.

john m