Menippean Satire?

[Joshua T]

hag asks:

>T F Flaherty calls Pynchon's genre "Menippean Satire". Can anyone explain
>what this is? Or refer me somewhere, pref. close by?

Probably got it from Northrop Frye's _Anatomy of Criticism_ (Princeton UP,
1957).  C. Hugh Holman's _A Handbook to Literature_, 4th ed. (Indianapolis:
Bobbs-Merrill, 198O, 1983) suggests it usually has more "conflict[s] of
ideas" than plot or character development and cites John Barth's _Giles
Goatboy_ as "an almost perfect example" (p. 263).

Josh