SLSL "TSR" Buddhist or Bud Man- the banality of plot

[Paul Mackin]

The kind of frustration and perplexity expressed here with respect to
TSR is likely to be fairly widespread. The remedy is to always keep
reminding ourselves that these stories are the early apprentice work of
someone who--it just happened to turn out--became some years later a
highly accomplished and admired writer. In other words these stories
aren't interesting because they are good but because Pynchon wrote them.
Not that examining them in a manner we might use to evaluate the work of
a seasoned literary or commercial writer is not OK or even useful, but
we have to be prepared for the  consequences. .

Tendentiously,

P.

On Tue, 2002-12-10 at 20:51, Mutualcode at aol.com wrote:
> It is not just the pine trees that are ugly and the cries of 
> the frogs which are stupid. Lardass Levine's entire existence 
> within the story is pretty stupid, as well. Are there any hints 
> of something more than yer average Bud man here?
> 
> If this is the story of the developement of character, it 
> seems to hinge on Levine's spur-of-the-moment decision 
> to break ranks and join in the harvest of stiffs, floating 
> Chagall-like on the roofs of houses, amongst the fences 
> and trees.
> 
> Equally as significant, it would seem, is the vague pact
> or covenant between Levine and Rizzo which allows Levine
> the freedom to expose himself to the mindless carnage
> of the storm while avoid being caught AWOL. But while
> Rizzo is able to figure out where Levine went, neither he
> nor Levine, nor the reader for that matter, are really
> given anything more than:
> 
>     ...letting it all happen, now(sic) exactly unwilling
>     to think about it nor quite unable; but realizing
>     somehow that the situation did not require
>     thought or rationalization. He was picking up
>     stiffs. That was what he was doing. (p.48)
> 
> His intial squeemishness has been replaced by an almost
> Buddhist-like emergence into pure being, beyond (or before)
> thought. Has he learned to keep his emotions under control,
> or, has he become cold and unfeeling?
> 
> Although his interaction with Little Buttercup seems to 
> evince signs that she might be a racist, this only causes
> Levine to "test" her accent to see if it matches Dugan's,
> which apparently, to his ear, it does. But that does not
> cause Levine to end the date. Nor does he challenge her
> views in any way. On the contrary, he plays along and 
> encourages the eventual outcome. It's as if he had never
> gone on the mortuary detail.
> 
> Furthermore, he allows himself to detect dismay in the
> eyes of Little Buttercup that he might be more than
> just a good fuck: 
> 
>     ...that what was hazarding this particular
>     plowboy was deeper than any problem of 
>     seasonal change or doubtful fertility.(p.50)
> 
> He apparently had already determined- like an
> anthropologist judging a member of some "primitive"
> culture, by her string of enumerated material wares-
> that her "giving capacity" was sufficiently impoverished
> to allow him to treat her as an object of his lust
> without more than nonchalant compassion. Finally, they 
> seem strangely equal in their banality. Or am I missing
> something?
> 
> respectfully