gore vidal article

[Coffey, Mitchell R]

>-----Original Message-----
>From: mdsheppard at mindspring.com [mailto:mdsheppard at mindspring.com]
>Sent: Monday, June 05, 2000 10:24 AM
>To: pynchon-l at waste.org
>Subject: gore vidal article
>
>
>Paul Mackin mentioned the article (NYRB 1976) in which Gore 
>Vidal critiques a laundry list of "postmodernist" writers.  
>Can anyone provide me with the crux of Vidal's beef with this 
>set of writers (Pynchon, Barth, Barthelme, etc)?  The author 
>of the David Foster Wallace review in a recent NYRB makes 
>reference to this article as well, noting that Vidal refers to 
>the above camp as "R&D" fiction.  
>If anyone can enlighten me on this I'd appreciate it.  I'd be 
>interested in hearing what pynchon list prople think of the 
>connection (to me spurious) that is made between this set of 
>authors.  It seems to me that the ethos of Barth and Pynchon, 
>for example, couldn't be more different....
>I'm new to this list BTW...I look forward to reading any comments.
>
>Matt Sheppard

I recall the Vidal NYRB article.  Vidal's complaint was that this class of
difficult liturature was written "to be taught, not to be read".  This
latter quote is from memory, and a quarter of a century old.

I see his point; it would be more accurate to say "to be studied, not to be
read."  That, of course, is one of the things I like about Pynchon, et al.
On the other hand, the shear pleasue - fun, even - of reading Pynchon,
available to those who make the effort, goes under reported.  Pynchon's
books are a riot.


Mitchell Coffey
_______________________________________________________
Slim Pickins rode the bomb down laughing
Bucking to oblivion
In gravity's rainbow rodeo

 - Found anonymously felt-penned onto a wall
   in the Bancroft Library on the UC Berkeley
   campus, c. 1977