R. Crumb and TRP

[Meg Larson]

"Too many textbooks and discussions leave students free to make up their
minds about things"
                                  --- Mel Gabler, Texas textbook critic 

Meg Larson
Saginaw Valley State University
mgl at tardis.svsu.edu              

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> From: Jay Herzog <jwh7 at axe.humboldt.edu>
> To: Keith Brecher <Keith_Brecher at brown.edu>
> Cc: Ted Samsel <tejas at infi.net>; pynchon-l at waste.org
> Subject: R. Crumb and TRP
> Date: Wednesday, March 19, 1997 4:04 AM
> 
> 	I recall before I read Gravity's Rainbow someone described it as
> being "a cross between James Joyce and Zap Comix". I have to admit
> although I like Joyce, the comparison to Crumb's work seemed more apropo.
> (another capsule description of GR was "Catch 22 as written by Wm.
> Burroughs). It's pretty absurd to try to reduce GR to a blurb...like
> writing the lord's prayer on the head of a pin.
>
My favorite blurb for _GR_ includes the words "bonecrushingly dense" and
"grindingly dull" as well as more lofty platitudes.  As a joke, the prof in
whose class I read it for the first time was going to ask this final exam
question on the novel: Explain _GR_ in 25 words or less.  Cruel, cruel man.

Just read COL49 in an independent study group; one of my groupmates, who
had not read it, asked me, with a straight face: "What's it about?"  I
couldn't tell him, because I haven't stopped laughing yet . . .