M&D Review in Sunday Times

[still lookin 4 the face i had b4 the world was made]

On 6 May 1997, Tiarnan O'Corrain wrote:
> The Sunday Times, cheerleading for the middlebrow
> middleEnglanders, published quite a hostile review(by Humphrey 
> Carpenter) of M&D last Sunday. This (in my book) counts as
> a plus for the novel.
> 
> Last two paras:
> 	'Perversely, slavery, of which the Line became a symbol, is
> only treated in a sideways fashion by Pynchon. 

Sideways?  I'd say it's all over the place.  What Mr. Reviewer wants, I
suppose, is a melodramatic scene where we see the cruel mistreatment of
slaves, and M's & D's noble emotions are offended, and they heroically
intervene, or something.  Or maybe just large capital letters that
say SLAVERY BAD, FREEDOM GOOD?

How the hell more directly can TRP treat slavery?  I could quote multiple
lengthy passages in which Mason, Dixon, and Cherrycoke (and others) speak,
think, or write about the fundamental moral evil of slavery and how it
distorts societies which depend on it.  Was Mr. Reviewer perhaps...skimming?

> Cameo appearances by George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and Boswell
>and Johnson are not in Pynchon's line of business at all, and would have
> been better omitted.

Haven't got to Boswell and Johnson yet, but as for Franklin and Washington,
TRP is writing about the founding of America, and these cameos are
enjoyable, interesting, and fully relevant.  (And well done.)  Who is
Mr. Reviewer to tell TRP what his line of business is?

> Seemingly borrowing from Stoppard as much as
> Shakespeare, Pynchon tries to make his heroes into another
> Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, uneasy minor characters in
> other people's dramas ­ they feel "As if we're Lodgers inside
> someone else's Fate . . . ". But there is no Hamlet, and the
> book eventually tails off with Mason and Dixon's declining
> years.

The Rosencrantz & Guildenstern comparison is nice...it captures a certain
feeling I've had at points while reading the book.  But why, then, must
Pynchon rewrite Hamlet (or R&GAD)?  Can he be permitted to do his thing, the
way he wants to do it, please?  (I might point out that it is well iwthin
TRP's established "line of business" to have characters who feel part of
some larger, unseen plot that they never quite figure out.  When did
Stoppard write his play?  I believe TRP was already an established
writer...)

> Books require readers as well as writers, and if
> Pynchon is to retain any sort of following, it is time he cast off
> the cloak of invisibility and made contact with his audience.'

Yes, let's get him on Good Morning, America, do some photo ops, a book tour!
Dammit, he's a snob!  He must be, since he never appears on TV!  What,
does he think he's too good for us?  Well, then his work must suck!

And why hasn't Hollywood filmed any of his books yet?  Hmm?  Snob!

Max

M a x i m u s  D a v i d  C l a r k e | Some ideas are so stupid
         http://www.afn.org/~traveler | that only intellectuals
                "Surrealist-At-Large" | could believe them.
                     traveler at afn.org | --Michael Levine