Forced Jokes (was Re: MDMD(8) Questions - Tunnels)

[davemarc]

> From: Sherwood, Harrison <hsherwood at btg.com>
>  
> I don't buy the Diggers/San Fran thingy. Sorta...forced, don't you
> think? 
> 
Hey--just 'cause it's forced doesn't mean it's not Pynchon!  Quite the
contrary.  Isn't the forced joke, like the awful pun, one of Tom's
tried-and-true tools?  What about M&D's surf music riff?  A-and the
rock'n'roll refs as the narrative on 243 goes hallucinogenic:  "Far away
upon the Shields a bell-buoy rings in the dank morning, and somewhere
closer, upon now-invisible Rounds, yet goes the Bell of the Tagareen
Man...."  But maybe I'm just seein' things myself.  Still, there are always
those wonderfully lame/brilliant comics jokes (i.e. the Popeye ref) and
those crazy old names:  Benny Profane, Dewey Gland, etc., u.s.w.

davemarc