Gore's rosebud

[Murthy Yenamandra]

Rodney Welch writes:
> [...] The fact that Mr. 
> Vidal has not written a Gravity's Rainbow doesn't keep him out of the 
> debate -- he's a practicing novelist and a brilliant essayist who has 
> delevered more lasting commentary about the United States in the 20th 
> Century than anyone who subscribes to this list likely ever will. [...]

As you say, he's a better essayist than a novelist and so all they're
saying is that his opinions of Pynchon (and other novelists) are just
that - his opinions - and don't necessarily have the weight of a
brialliant novelist behind them. (Now if Gaddis said that about TRP,
then we might take it more seriously... :-))

Obviously, no one critic makes or breaks TRP's reputation and even more
obviously, we, who are neither novelists nor essayists, have as much of
a right to an opinion of Vidal's novels - it's us, after all, that he's
trying to please with his "non-academic" novels. No need to keep anyone
out of any debate.

Murthy

-- 
Murthy Yenamandra, Dept of CompSci, U of Minnesota. mailto:yenamand at cs.umn.edu
    "I'm stubborn as those garbage bags that time can not decay
     I'm junk, but I'm holding up this little wild bouquet
     Democracy is coming to the USA" - Leonard Cohen