"fascist architecture" & Reagan-Bush America

[Doug Millison]

Vineland is set in 1984, with flashbacks. The Reagan-Bush Administration,
which employs Brock Vond (one of "the sleek raptors that decorate fascist
architecture") and "the notorious Karl Bopp, former Nazi Luftwaffe
officer"," begins in 1980.  The novel's association of Nazi Germany and
Reagan-Bush America stands. That Reagan continues what Nixon inherited -- a
"fascist architecture" onto which they both apply their own inimitable
stains -- would seem to be an important element of Vineland, and
constitutes an important link between GR and the later novel, which moves
back and forth between the earlier and later historical periods.  Vineland
associates Nixon, Reagan, and Bush with the Nazis; I can see how that might
be unpalatable for readers who admire those presidents.


jbor:
>You do mean Nixon-Reagan, don't you? But if you read the novel a little more
>closely you'll also note that Brock and his programs have been around since
>the mid-late 60s at least, since before the siege at the College of the
>Surf. Seems to me as if that "fascist architecture" has been around for some
>time prior to 1970. (Vineland 268-9)

on 28/6/02 6:37 AM, Doug Millison at millison@[omitted] wrote:
> Brock Vond works for the Reagan-Bush
> Administration, so when Pynchon describes him as one of "the sleek raptors
> that decorate fascist architecture" the text does invite us to compare Nazi
> Germany and Reagan-Bush America.