Pynchon the gentle sadomasochist

[Paul Mackin]

On Sun, 9 Jul 2000, Terrance wrote:
> 
> Does McHale cite Norman O. Brown or Weber or McCluhan?  


Negative as far as the two works I have seen. Neither Freud nor Lacan
either for the Eros angle. Cites mostly fiction writers
but also structuralist, post-structuralists, semioticians, litcriters,
culturecriters. Derrida, Bathes, Lyotard, many more. Barth, Gass, Gardner
as critics. An interesting outlier is Douglas Hofstatder. Strange loops
are considered. Did I mention Woody Allen? Pynchon's name is dropped 40
times according to the index. That could be the record.

> > > > In discussing the use of the second person pronoun as a means of
> > > > violating the ontological boundaries between writer, reader, and
> > > > character, McHale comes to the conclusion that the actual subject
> > > reefers and shivers, cut my throat....oh! God, oh!
> > 
> > Yes, an imaginative performance but a critic is entitled to push the
> > data sometimes if in a good cause. 
> 
> Could it be that McHale's reading of GR's narrator's is a
> misreading? Does he have these relationship correct, the one
> between author and reader? 

Well, one thing he has going for him is that violating ontological
boundaries (by addressing the reader directly) is a just about perfect
metephor for love making. And his examples of the use of the second person
pronoun all seem to me to be valid cases of the narrator speaking directly
to the reader. He also gives examples where 'you' has other meanings and
some of the reader-you examples also are at the same time character-you
examples as in the Pointsman quote. You might argue that, since his
case--that addressing the reader signifies love making--depends so much
on an aggressive stance on the part of the narrator, McHale may see
these aggressions  and assaults more than is actually justified in
the text. I can't quite always see Pynchon as the forceful lover. 

Of course I've only read a small part of the book and could be totally off
the track. Very speculative.

			P.