Rushdie and Pynchon

[David Simpson]

Have been a lurker here for only a few weeks, so please excuse if this
topic has already been raked over numerous times. While reading
Rushdie's "The Ground Beneath Her Feet" (a very ingenious, droll,
satirical novel about politics and pop culture in the rock 'n roll
era--and a book, incidentally, which Pynchon lovers are almost sure to
enjoy), I came across the following exchange, said to take place in some
"auction rooms in San Narciso, Calif." (p 400-401):

"So you're here for what, Yul demands . . . .

First let me tell you why you're here, says Mull. Turns out you're
interested in conspiracies, underground organizations, militias, the
whole right-wing paranoid America thing. Who knows why. You're here to
bid for the memorabilia of some defunct immigrant cabal, used to go
around writing DEATH on people's walls. Don't Ever Antagonize The Horn.
They had a trumpet logo. Nice."

Am wondering, anybody ever pursue a Rushdie-Pynchon connection? Are they
pen pals, mutual admirers, literary lunch buddies, or anything? GBHF, by
the way, plays extensively with the Orpheus legend and hence draws
significantly on Rilke's celebrated "Orpheus/Eurydice/Hermes" as well as
the Sonnets to Orpheus and Duino Elegies (the latter of course famously
dedicated to Princess Marie von Thurn und Taxis-Hohenloe).


--
"Human life must be some kind of mistake."--Schopenhauer