GRGR1 - Giant Adenoid

[Craig Clark]

Skip Wolfe writes:

> Interestingly, I don't think Pynchon engages in obfuscation for its own sake 
> (something I don't think we can say of all contemporary writers).  On the 
> other hand, I think he tries to be as clear as possible, given what he's 
> trying to do.  He could easily drop a name -- Kekule, say -- and leave it to 
> the reader to figure out why it's there; but he will often spend whole pages 
> giving details on references and explaining how they relate to the passage 
> where they're inserted.  O-or is he just giving us more chaos to try to make 
> order out of . . .

It's definitely not obfuscation for its own sake. I think the massive 
wodges of information which Pynchon gives us not only introduce more 
chaos to make order out of (or vice versa), but also demonstrate the 
massive complexity of the world we live in, "a world gone mad" where 
"information is the only medium of exchange". In this sense TRP, who 
is not a "mimetic" writer as one normally understands the term, is 
demonstrating a fidelity to mimesis far in excess of many other authors
(and signalling the unreliability of such analytic categories).

As far as my Joyce comparison is concerned (and I'm about to incur 
the wrath of Joyce lovers on this list), I have always felt that both 
_Ulysses_ and _Finnegan's Wake_ are fabulous over-elaborations of a 
simple idea, whereas _GR_ is a fabulous over-elaboration of a series 
of complex ideas. Okay, flame me as an ignorant reductionist...

  
Craig Clark

"Living inside the system is like driving across
the countryside in a bus driven by a maniac bent
on suicide."
   - Thomas Pynchon, "Gravity's Rainbow"