historical or not? [was Re: Pynchonian Rorschach]

[jporter]

Vaska, responds to Henry:

>Henry Musikar writes:
>>Is Jody suggesting that there isn't a consensus, or simply that
>>Jules didn't "provoke this consensus?" There never is a consensus on
>>this list. Bu-ut I haven't haven't heard any reasonable argument
>>against the suggestion that Pynchon's concern for historical accuracy
>>has declined post-GR. IMHO, most of the discussion of this issue is
>>more concerned with whether Pynchon's work should really be considered
>>historical fiction, and if so, shouldn't we then  "require" it to
>>stand up to the same tests to which the hold the work of other
>>historical novelists?
>

An interesting qoute of a quote in Richard Holmes review of Penelope
Fitzgerald's "The Blue Flower" in this fortnight's NYRB, ascribed by
Fitzgerald to the German Romantic, Novalis, on whom the book is based:

        "Novels arise out of the shortcomings of history."

I love it.


>I see your point, Henry.  But it's not entirely fair to put it down to a
>question of genre: _GR_ and _V_ are not exactly historical novels either....
>
>Also, I wouldn't want to blow the "historical accuracy" issue out of all
>proportion: for the most part, _M&D_ seems to have been mightily well
>researched.  This impression may reflect my ignorance, don't know, but my
>guess is that Pynchon has simply become a little inattentive here and there.
>And if that's true, it *is* news.

Great big assumptions are being made by the reader/critic if the
writer/narrator  is judged as "inattentive" based on felicity with a
particular history. It would seem less spurious to point out such
differences, and leave speculation as to the attentiveness of "the author"
to those with an axe to grind. Such speculations are usually more revealing
of the mind of the axe wielder.

>With Pynchon specifically -- I don't know what your copies of _V_ are like,
>but I still have my first copy bought in Malta 21 years ago, and in this
>edition the British characters "speak" in an English spelling, for instance
>[it's that level of attention to detail...] -- it comes as something of a
>jolt to find a few errors cropping up in an 800-page text.  With any other
>novelist, it wouldn't be much of an issue at all.
>
>And now that Meg has called us all to order, let's get back to _M&D_ and see
>what each of us, variously, thinks of Pynchon's take on the Enlightenment,
>say, or his treatment of slavery, and so on.
>
>Vaska


A very reasonable idea,

jody