Gravity's Rainbow, A book about war?

[Eric Rosenbloom]

Gabriel Luci wrote:
> Does GR center around war of any sort?

It _centers_ around the dream of a manned V2 rocket. It is set at the
end of WWII, starting in London with the rockets raining down like
avenging angels, its hits eerily corresponding to American Tyrone
Slothrop's sexual activity, as if in reaction to his life reflex.

The war, however, stays in the background. As it moves in its final days
towards Berlin, Slothrop is sent to the Riviera to bone up on everything
the British know about the V2. Becoming mistrustful of the hidden
purposes of The Firm, Slothrop escapes to wander the post-war Zone in
search of his connection to the manned V2. He finds out that his father
sold him as an infant for pychological research, apparently involving an
experimental _erectile_ plastic, Imipolex G, and that he has been
watched ever since. He had already caught an unnumbered invoice for some
of that Imipolex G for insulation inside a special rocket . . .

By the end of the book, Slothrop's presence is spread thin and he
effectively disappears, establishing the possibility that he and
everything in the book, including war and secret cartels, was just a
nightmare . . .

In Gravity's Rainbow, I think, war is just a concentration of the usual
violence wrought by the "invisible" hand of the market. It is a
rearrangement of cartels to re-establish their secrecy.

The last part of Gravity's Rainbow is called "Counterforce," and several
players attempt to re-establish their humanity against the cruelty of
The System.

Good luck, your paper on this would certainly be unique among your classmates!

Go Saoraid,
Eric R



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