TWILIGHT OF THE IDOL

[Brecher_Keith/mskcc_Neurology at mskmail.mskcc.org]

Item Subject: Re: A simple Pynchon:Gaddis analogy
     I'm surprised to hear from Meg Larson that M&D held up for her on 
     re-reading, but I'm frankly alarmed that D O U G  M I L L I S O N has 
     continued to find M&D deeper and more moving the closer he reads and 
     re-reads. Bowel moving, maybe....
        Chris asked what it was I liked about TRP's novels and it's 
     actually the same stuff he does so badly in M&D. V, CL49, and 
     GR--especially GR--were great magic acts, but since VINELAND, TRP's 
     unfortunately shown his easily beguiled audience exactly how he does 
     his tricks. A better analogy even than Gaddis:FROLIC is Pynch:Wizard 
     of Oz. Bluster and special effects conceal a tall man behind a curtain 
     with expensive dental work and a red hat who's got nothing much
     to say, but insists on taking 800 pages to say it. 
        Consequently, I would like to know exactly what Doug Millison has 
     found so incredibly deep in M&D. One of Nietzsche's epigrams from the 
     appositely titled TWILIGHT OF THE IDOLS fits M&D very nicely:
     
     "Women are considered profound. Why? Because one never fathoms their 
     depths. Women aren't even shallow."
     
        This is exactly the case in M&D. TRP's Mircea Eliade/Joe Campbell act is
     so thin in VINELAND and M&D that it finally demonstrates just how hollow 
     the great Holy Center moments of GR and CL49 actually are. Which is 
     disappointing, though not nearly so much as reading M&D a second time and 
     having to grit your teeth through all the lame jokes, bad dialogue, and
     fake mysticism. 
        Meg concluded, not incorrectly, that I expected M&D to outdo GR. Sure I 
     did. Didn't you, Meg? After all, didn't everybody console themselves when  
     VINELAND came out that it just couldn't be the great, GR-sized novel TRP   
     had been working on for the last eighteen years? Well, evidently M&D is    
     that novel and even considered apart from GR and all of TRP's good stuff,  
     it still sucks. M&D probably should have been a short story. Why TRP felt  
     compelled to inflate it to an 800 page soporific probably had something to 
     do with trying to scale GR. Unfortunately, like those poor bastards frozen 
     on Mount Everest, he didn't make it.
        Did I like anything in M&D? Very little. As I mentioned before, some of 
     the writing is eloquent, but it's generally so thick and gnarly that 
     reading M&D is like breathing peanut butter. I particularly hate Pitt and  
     Pliny. In fact, I despise all of Cherrycoke's irritating relatives. And    
     most of all, 'Brae. Why does TRP have such great fondness for these        
     annoying adolescent girls (i.e, Prairie)? And, before I forget, the twin   
     motif calls to mind the fact that M&D did finally prove similar to THE     
     SOT-WEED FACTOR, to the former's detriment since SOT-WEED is the much      
     better novel and clearly demonstrates that Barth does capitalized Speech   
     alot better than TRP. I'll take the Marylandiad over the Pennsylvaniad just
     about any day, except Monday (because of what Bob Geldorf said about it). 
        Finally, I agree that reviews are more self-reviews than objective 
     statements, but so what? If anybody out there has an objective review of
     M&D, please send it on to me immediately so that I can see what one looks  
     like.     

     P.S. Who the hell is Harrison Sherwood and why do I care?

______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Re: A simple Pynchon:Gaddis analogy
Author:  christinekaratnytsky (christinekaratnytsky at juno.com) at Internet-SHAR
Date:    9/3/97 9:30 PM


Before responding to specific points in Keith's post, I'd like to ask him 
a serious question:
     
What do you *like* about Thomas Pynchon's novels?
     
I wasn't able to detect what that might be from your post, as every novel 
from V. to Vineland received some fairly devastating criticism, and  I 
just don't have a clear sense of why you think TRP a worthy writer in the 
first place.  Can you elucidate?  A-&--was there *nothing* in M&D that 
you liked?  *Nothing* that amused, even?
     
just asking,
Chris
     
P.S.  Harrison Sherwood, where are yooooooou?!