V.V. (18) Pynchon's use of myth

[jbor]

Thanks for providing all those useful definitions Otto. You and I've been
discussing the way that various Classical myths have perhaps been interwoven
into the chapter on 'V. in Love'. The story of Apollo's son Aristaeus (the
best) certainly is brought into play with references to the dog star and
plague, and the subsequent reference to the beekeeper, as you noted before,
and I think that the story of Asclepius (unceasingly gentle) is there as
well. Other of Apollo's children, such as the Corybantes (crested dancers),
Miletus (painted with red ochre) perhaps, and even the story of Apollo,
Thamyris and Hyacinthus (the first homosexual love triangle), could be seen
to figure in the sequence as well. Pynchon sets up this type of reading at
the outset, the reference to Sirius, those seven unnamed allegorical statues
on the Gare, Melanie calling out "Papa!" when she sees the statue of Apollo,
the blood like "pale ichor" which runs through the family's veins, and so
forth.

But I think that Pynchon uses these myths eclectically, creates something of
a composite. Or, another way of looking at it would be to say that he hints
that there is going to be a single mythical subtext, primes the reader for
such a reading (eg. like _Ulysses_ perhaps), but then he pulls the rug out
from under our feet by not following through with any one, jumbles them all
in together and leaves both text *and* subtext unresolved. (Again, there is
a difference between Modernist and postmodern writing in this regard.)

I don't get the impression, as Paul does, that Melanie's function is to
destroy men and women through her sexual allure. After all it is she who is
destroyed by her own eroticism (although, the true reason why she didn't put
on the protective device, "a species of *chastity* belt", remains unknown:
multiple possibilities persist, no-one will ever know. 414) I think that
something might also be made of the Asclepius myth and Derrida pointing out
the way that the Platonic use of the term "pharmakon" in the _Phaedrus_
deconstructs itself, turns back and forth ceaselessly between its
denotations of poison and cure at its every appearance or utterance. (Plato,
valorising speech, in fact uses its latter sense as a metaphor to describe
writing in the speech/writing binary he attempts to construct.) In the myth
Athene gave Asclepius two phials of the Gorgon Medusa's blood: with what had
been drawn from the left side, he could raise the dead, with what had been
drawn from her right, he could destroy instantly. Melanie's attraction is
like this. Because V. *can* love she is momentarily resued from the "Kingdom
of Death", the "Street" full of tourists, which she had been inhabiting
until then ("The lady V., one of them for so long, now suddenly found
herself excommunicated; bounced unceremoniously into the null-time of human
love" 409.22), but Melanie's narcissistic love contains a form of corruption
(or poison) within itself also.

Ultimately the thunderbolt does strikes (Asclepius was slain by Zeus for
challenging the gods' monopoly over immortality) -- premonitions of
Melanie's fate have been manifest in the thunder and heat lightning which
have been threatening all the time -- and the angel on a stick is risen up
high into the sky, becomes a "star" for a fleeting moment (at Apollo's
request the god of medicine was placed among the constellations, as
Ophiuchus, the serpent bearer), and V. herself is left to her doom.

best


----------
>From: "Otto" <o.sell at telda.net>
>

> Couldn't agree more of course. The "religious writer" is the box they put
> him in, but it makes him small.
> First Terrance says "maybe the term "religious writer" is a box we can't
> use. It's too big and too small at the same time" and later "Pynchon is, I
> submit,  our most important religious writer." But at least there's a
> serious question: "What is a religious writer in the postmodern world?" --
> Answer: no religion without binaries, sinners and saints, above and below.
> No postmodern novel without the topic of religion possible imo 'cause
> religion, pre-Christian religious rites like the 'Sacre de Printemps' lie at
> the foundation of our culture.