GOD MODE--potential spoilers--Greg Egan--Walter Kirn

[jporter]

Keith, loggin' in from (Rect'l?) brown.edu, conjectures:

>It seems that TRP punched GOD MODE into his puncutron for M&D, though
>G-d knows Walter Kirn--if he cannot be forgiven for reviewing M&D without
>having finished it, maybe can be tithed a bit for honesty--made some
>ripping good points in his SLATE review. I've been wondering about those
>other reviewers who commented that the humor in M&D is hilarious because,
>like Kirn, I personally developed a tight sickly grin during some of the
>goofy parts in M&D. The George Washington and Gershom (Scholem) scene comes
>to mind. And that runaway four ton cheese is probably absolutely fucking
>hilarious...if you're stoned or have bilateral defects in Brodmann areas 9
>and 12 of your prefrontal cortex causing distortion of your sense of humor.

Please don't mistake me for just another one of the faithful, but those
humorous scenes you and many of the "reflex reviewers" you are attempting
to differentiate yourself from, could be constued as vehicles for some of
the most serious and solemn ideas in the book. Perhaps your tightening grin
is a subconscious recognition of that. Hang in there.

>   The reviews in general, however, seem pretty much in sync with what I
>thought about M&D (TC Boyle, Anthony Lane, and that damned Voice critic hit
>all the main points): TRP's most moving novel; a more restrained, mature
>work than GR; proves that VINELAND was an aberration...blah blah blah. I
>thought the dammed Voice reviewer really got it right when she said that
>M&D is the work of a weary, old man, .....

Yes. Odysseus has returned. Gandalf is now white. Obe One has achieved
extracorpreal non-locality...And you seem to feel the need to flex your
muscles.


 On
>first reading, I had the sense that Ruggles was playing a sort of greatest
>hits, golden oldies, walk down memory lane kind of thing like Mucho Maas'
>re-appearance in VINELAND as Count Drugula. Ancestors to beloved characters
>like Pig Bodine and Ronald Cherrycoke, another lame integral joke, drugs,
>talking animals, Vineland the Good, farinaceously, grotesque medical
>exhibits, drugs, lots of aarrgh's, parabolas, v's, groovy mysticism,
>mysterious symbols, drugs, Anubis-style decadence, Mutt-and-Mutter-type
>buddies, the usual poems and songs. And lots more I can't think of right
>now...

Lethe will do that, but apparently you haven't made the transit yet. So
what's your excuse? You sound like some thanatoid with a very dull axe. Let
me help you obtain an edge.

but the upshot was that occasionally I thought M&D could be matched
>point to point like one of TRP's map metaphors with precedents in his other
>fiction. Hey, the map is the territory, right?

You must be Jesting. Either that, or too many hours on the Tanis court in
the hot sun. Frankly, I think you're digging in the wrong place. Maybe you
should take back a few comments, in honor of the writer whose list this is,
and adjust your headstone. Either that or return to more straightfoward
novelists, like E.L. Doggerel (who's that?).

>   Though, I guess TRP's broken new ground here with a linear (westerly?)
>narrative and all that Sot Weed-style Jargon. M&D may be the tome the Nobel
>Prize committee have been waiting for demonstrating that Ruggles has indeed
>atoned for the coprophagia in GR. Except for those ripped bodices, M&D's
>pretty tame and Very Literary indeed. If Crumb's gonna animate GR, Disney
>should do M&D. It'd be a great follow-up to POCOHANTAS. Not to mention
>great fodder for Disney's America.

The line between the sacred and the profane, transubstantiation and dross,
silk and sow's ear is probably, as Drasp and Lepton work out, more like a
three dimensional version of the double integral: a helixxx. No area under
the curve here, more like the unseen influence around which it may be
wrapped- unseen but not unfelt- like that streaming from the outstretched
cloven hands of priests blessing the flock.


>[RED ALERT: THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH IS A RANT. SKIP AHEAD TO THE NEXT
>PARAGRAPH FOR MORE CIVIL DISCOURSE AND/OR IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ ME
>EMBARRASS MYSELF]

I won't comment on your "rant." Your alert message is more than adequate
warning for what follows it.

>Keith
>

Keith. Hmmm. If I believed in metempsychosis I might be fooled into
thinking that Steely lives...

Anyway, whoever you are, you sound interesting and refreshing. I hope you
have a sense of humor,

jody