Stockpiled weapons???

[Paul Mackin]

On Wed, 14 Jun 2000, Richard Romeo wrote:

> One way Pynchon is like >Christianity is that he seems at times to accept 
> the idea that there was >an original paradisiacal state. This is the Life 
> that once was and somehow >might be returned to. The possibility of Return. 
> Unfortunately this is >what some people find a tiny bit sappy about his 
> stuff. Many don't
> >however. Of course it's all irony.
> >
> >			P.
> >-----------------
> I would say that Pynchon doesn't necessarily accept the idea of an exalted 
> state, but that he probes what mankind has driven itself to, based on that 
> supposed goal.  Many of his characters have such aspirations, but at what 
> price:  Pokler's naivete, Weissman's brutal aesthetics, Frenesi's dream of 
> living outside the system, e.g.
> 
> In some ways, that exalted state is otherwise known as America, and as we 
> see in M&D, it's conception, if you will, was perverted from the beginning.


Good points, Rich. Yes, the example of the place that should have been
better. No doubt this is ironical commentary (knowing P as I do) on
America the Exception. But myths have foundations. There was much that was
exceptional in the generation following the American Revolution. There's
a review of a new book "Inheriting the Revolution: The First Generation
of Americans" in the current NYRB. The reviewer is Gordon Wood who has
written marvelously, IMHO, on the American Revolution. 


			P.