Slate, Mason Dixon and general randomness..

[Greg Montalbano]

Joel Weierman sez:
>
>I was reading the Slate review
>(http://www.slate.com/BookReview/97-05-06/)
>and had to wholeheartedly agree with him. 
>I have tried many times to read Pynchon
>(I am giving GR another go right now)
>but the most succesful and rewarding
>was when I read the Crying of Lot 49
>in a politics class in college. Through
>lots of discussion and general hints
>about some of the more subtle themes
>I was able to see the novel not as just some
>bizarre play on words, but as a very
>political novel. Since I began reading
>on my own, I've had a rougher go of it.
>
>Its such a contrast reading something so 
>"simple"(?) like "The Liar's Club" seems
>so easy and so rewarding, its almost
>like I am cheating or something.
>
>That's where I really agree with Mr. Kirn...
>I think I may give up half-way through
>Mason & Dixon and leave Pynchon 
>on the shelf.....
>
>What do other folks think out there?

Well, what I think is that Kirn's review (which tells us more about Kirn and
his pre-judgements of Pynchon than it does about M&D) is representative of
the current American trend towards BINARY THINKING.

There has always been the perception among the "Great Wad" (a term I borrow
with thanks from Harlan Ellison) that intellect and emotion are two
diametrically opposed qualities;  that emotion is warm, human, GOOD, and
that intellect is cold, machinelike, EVIL.  Not only does this ignore the
fact that intellect is just about the ONLY quality that differentiates
"humans" from the rest of the universe (can you have a more "human" quality
than that?), but that -- and I don't want to startle anybody here --
intellect can be a USEFUL (even INDISPENSABLE) component of _real_ emotion.
{I believe it was LeGuin who remarked that "Emotion is not the opposite of
Reason;  the opposite of Reason is Unreason."}

What reviewers like Kirn & the Scientific American seem incapable of
imagining is that there exist those of us (indeed, ENOUGH of us to make
someone like Pynchon a big seller) who not only APPRECIATE the humor,
pathos, terror, joy, etc etc etc that we find in Pynchon's writing --
we THRIVE on it.
I know I've said it before, but in this context it bears repeating: I've
never taken a Lit class of any sort -- I was handed a copy of V when it was
first published, read it FOR THE FUN OF IT (are you listening, Kirn?), was
floored, ravished, bemused, and ELEVATED by the experience, and eagerly
sought out every succeeding work by the man.

No, I do NOT find the reading "difficult".  What I find difficult is
attempting to choke down the Tom Clancys & Jackie Collins' that people keep
trying to force on me;  and when I spit these indigestible hunks of pap back
up, I'm confronted with another of this country's endearing characteristics:
reverse snobbery.   

~G~