Vineland and V. (was Re: Holt publishing)

[Ben Freeman]

Steve-- 
	at the age of 22 and getting close to finishing my xth year at
college the profane chapters of V. hit me among the most earnest and
vividly real chapters Pynchon's written. Women are maligned a bit, but
the whole car-sex scene and anything written about the blur of
youthful new york seems to capture real events experienced, not
"reimagined" by a real person. When it strays to the Baedegger (sp?)
guides in Egyptland, its an intellectual pursuit, whereas the NYC
portions seem to translate real experiences. That exploits neat
emotional and spiritual terrain for me, the same terrain as the woe
(and seemingly autobiographically so) of roger mexico for jessica
wabbit. this thread is obvious, and, in my opinion valuable because
its real ground for a lot of masturbatory artistic and intellectual
posturing. which isn't to say there's anything *wrong* with that.
Shit, that's half the reason i like it.
				
 
	


	
> To paraphrase what I wrote about V. about a year ago, I think the chapters
> about Stencil's search are mostly excellent.  The chapters about Benny and
> the Whole Sick Crew mostly aren't nearly as good, and I think if any of
> Pynchon's major works showcase some of the faults present in his short
> stories (as he has discussed), it's these Profane chapters of V.  For
> example, women who hang around with the Crew (except, of course, for the
> major ones) are often not given names, are referred to as camp followers
> or something, and are not given any characteristics to distinguish one
> from another. In contrast, male characters, even those who just stop in
> for one or two mentions, are generally named and given one or more
> distinguishing characteristics.  In other ways too parts of the Whole Sick
> Crew chapters to my ear resonate with sophomoric sensibilities.  All this
> aside, I still rate V. as a great, though flawed, work.