V.V. (12) Pynchon's letter to Thomas F. Hirsch

[Dave Monroe]

okay, do have some stuff on V. to post, but ...

--- jbor <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> 
> ----------
> >From: Dave Monroe <davidmmonroe at yahoo.com>
> >
> 
> > To clarify, to say that "the thing goes much
> deeper"
> > is not to exclude "what later happened to the Jews
> in
> > the 30's and 40's."
> 
> No, simply to say that such an observation is
> "hardly profound" and the one
> he arrived at after explotring the topic only
> "superficially".

Which is not to say this is a "superficial" point. 
Again, with V., the Herero genocide is concatenated
specifically with the Holocaust, but the point in the
letter is, this is an obvious connection, and one
hardly needed Pynchon to make it (though in some cases
...).  Nevertheless, he does, and, here, in what is
unambiguously his "own" voice ...
 
> I don't think he mentions dodoes in the letter. 

No, but as we've been shuttling back and forth from V.
through that letter and on to Gravity's Rainbow ...

What
> he sets up in the
> examples there are oppositions between Christian
> imperialists and
> non-Christian societies or communities: Pizarro (a
> Catholic imperialist?) v.
> the Incas; the Founding Fathers

Here I might mention that, unintentionally imported
European diseases aside, the Native Americans suffered
more, intnetionally, at least, under the United States
during the nineteenth century rather than under the
"Founding Fathers" or the colonists who preceeded
them, though I know what you mean, I'd certainly make
similarly minor missteps through, say, Australian
history ...

 v. the Nth American
> Indians; the German
> Christians v. the Herero (as well as "what later
> happened to the Jews in the
> 30s and 40s, so I don't really think he's suddenly
> talking about Nazi
> neo-paganism as the persecuting force in that
> particular case); and, as you
> say, somewhat unusually:
> 
>     ... what is
>     now being done on the Buddhist head in Vietnam
> by the Christian minority
>     in Saigon and their advisors ...

This is, of course, Pynchon's "unusual" phrase and not
my own ...
 
> I'm wondering about the accuracy of that neat
> polemical construction myself.

... though you seem to realize this, despite your own
"unusual" (in that I can't figure out what I'm
allegedly saying "somewhat unsusually") comment.  But
he does seem to be straining that
Christian/non-Christian binary there, indeed ...
 
> But, regardless, the point of the letter is that,
> after the writing of _V._,
> Pynchon's "deeper" interests in the history of the
> Herero civilisation
> included studies in "comparative religion", and one
> conclusion that he came
> to circa 1969 is that, "far from being a minor
> sideshow", the clash between
> the missionary-colonials and the Herero in the
> Sudwest is "archetypical of
> every clash between the west and non-west"
> throughout several hundreds of
> years of history across the globe:
> 
>     the imposition of a culture valuing
>     analysis and differentiation on a culture that
> valued unity and
>     integration.

This, I think, is more the "deeper" point or whatever
here.  Still subject to its own deconstructions, but I
suspect these are performed to some extent in, by
Gravity's Rainbow itself, which often seems to
problematize such neat binaries, even as it
(inevitably, to deconstruction) deploys them.  And,
again, there are assemblages far beyond mere
Christianity ((c) C.S. Lewis) under consideration as
well.  And, again (and again and ...), the Holocaust
has not been suddenly erased from consideration as
well here ... 

> Another way of putting this, it seems to me, is that
> the first type of
> culture arrogantly believes in its own superiority
> and Elect status, and
> actively attempts to convert or destroy "the Other"
> whenever and wherever it
> can, while the latter cultures accept the natural
> unity of all peoples and
> things. I think I know which side Pynchon's
> sympathies lie in _GR_.

This sounds good at first, but even "natural unities"
more often than not turn out to be human constructs,
or, at any rate, subject to human construction.  Even,
perhaps, a sort of generalized monism, which
recognizes the human construction of differences
across presumably undifferentiated "nature," or,
perhaps, matter, "matter," which is subject, like
nature, to its own ideological constructions--"nature"
vs. ...? "matter" vs. ...? What is "not-nature,"
"not-matter" here? The point is, there are any number
of possibilities, all with their own ideological,
deconstructible investments.  Again, that
deconstruction of Pynchon's characterization as
"pre-literate" of what is indeed Herero
categorization, "arche-ecriture," generalized writing.

And note also that the "unity"--or, rather,
"unities"--Pynchon proposes for the Herero are the
premises for his ability to consider "perfectly
plausible" "the notion, apparently widely-held at the
time, that the Hereros were deliberately trying to
exterminate themselves," which is obviously problmatic
as well.  Even if it turned out to be true.  Ditto the
Incas.  Rather tends to mitigate most any criticism of
the atrocities involved.

Here's a question.  Pynchon closes, "Far from being a
minor side-show in African history, I think it could
be vitally important to people's understanding of
what's going on in the world these days."  Is the
implication that, among other things, we are
"deliberately trying to exterminate ourselves"?  If
so, then, what do we do about it?  Anything?  Nothing?
 I do not think that Pynchon is actually advising us
to start jerking away as the Rocket is at its "final
delta-t."  One does not go to that much trouble merely
to say, we asked for it,  and, one day, at least,
we'll get it ...

On that eminently decosntructible East/West binary, by
the way, see not only ...

Longxi, Zhang.  "The 'Tao' and the 'Logos':
   Notes on Derrida's Critique of Logocentrism."
   Critical Inquiry, Vol. 11, No. 3 (March 1985).

But also ...

Said, Edward.  Orientalism.
   New York: Pantheon, 1978.

Though I'm guessing these are fairly well known here,
so ...

Again, Pynchon may or may not actually deploy these
binaries, they may or may not be operative in his
texts.  I think, as, I think, you think, that, yes, he
does, yes, they are, but I do not think they are
deployed quite so naively, and/or quite so willfully
unproblematically, and certainly not in Gravity's
Rainbow, "intentionally" or not.  If so, well, then,
we've some Pynchon to deconstruct then ... ...

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