Idolatry

[Andrew Clarke Walser]

On Tuesday, 13 May 1997, Jules Siegel wrote:

	Is this the Thomas Ruggles Pynchon, Jr., fan club?  Are we allowed
only to offer fawning praise to his talent . . .?  What is really going
on here?

Unfortunately, Jules has a point here.  I thought the discussion of Gore
Vidal's "American Plastic" -- carried on, predominantly, by those who had
not read the essay -- showed a depressing philistinism.  As much as I
admire Pynchon, I do not admire him as a hockey fan does the Blackhawks,
or as a Trekkie does Captain Kirk.  

Jules also raises, later in his posting, an interesting question:  Does
the INACCURACY of some of Pynchon's work mar it aesthetically?  Does
Pynchon sacrifice a potentially valuable realism -- one toward which he
seems to lean -- for the sake of cheap literary effects?  And does MASON
AND DIXON reveal a different attitude toward historical "fidelity" than,
say, GRAVITY'S RAINBOW?

				Andrew Walser
			     University of Illinois-Chicago