Vidal Rots Away in Italian Villa

[andrew at cee.hw.ac.uk]

Rodney Welch writes:
> Rodney Welch wrote:
> > 
> > Mittelwerk at aol.com wrote:
> > >
> > > Gore Vidal:  The Aschenbach of American Letters
> > >
> > > Despite the occassional black penis here and there, overall there was
> > > probably not enough dish in GR to appease him . . .
> > 
> > Oh, yeah -- when all else fails, there's always homophobia...

Err, I don't think you `got' Mittelwerk's point (`got' as in the way
you suggest one might `get' GR). He's not a homophobe, nothing like a
homophobe. Actually, he's just pointing at a rather boring and
annoying habit of Vidal's which is to admix camp into his criticism
whether it is germane to the subject matter or not. And you also
appear to be misreading Craig Clark - clearly you too could learn
something learn from Vidal when it comes to textualscrutiny.

Vidal is a pretty lousy novelist (I've read 3 novels that I can recall
and I think some others which I am glad to have forgotten). His books
may indeed reveal much more complexity than yer average 6th-grader's
short stories but they are nothing like up to the mark when compared
to Pynchon's writing (there is no need to try to wriggle out a case
that they are merely incommensurate - I'll argue that Vidal's novels
are decidedly pisspoor even for what they attempt to be). Combine this
with some passing comments on GR which suggest to anyone who has read
the book in depth (and there are many such people on this list),
comments which revealthat Vidal does not know his Angel from his
elbow, and lo and behold the man's credentials as an interpreter of
Pynchon look pretty skimpy - and that's irrespective of the fine
qualities of his essays, historical fantasies on Burr, Lincoln etc or
his fer real lit criticism.

So, much as your defense of Vidal's finer qualities may be more grist
to your mill, you have bypassed altogether the force of the original
criticism which is that Vidal appears to know little of the craft of
writing novels and in Pynchon's case seems to have little critical
insight worth offering. Rather than tell me I don't really know my (or
rather your) Vidal - I'll admit that in advance if it helps - instead
do me a favour and use your obvious familiarity with the man's work to
explain to me why his comments on GR need to be taken seriously.
Seriously, I am interested in anything which sheds light on Pynchon
and this is the Pynchon list so please illuminate.


Andrew Dinn
-----------
And though Earthliness forget you,
To the stilled Earth say:  I flow.
To the rushing water speak:  I am.