Forget Conspiracy

[John Bailey]

>From: Richard Romeo <romeocheeseburger at yahoo.com>
>Date: Wed, 27 Nov 2002 09:04:57 -0800 (PST)
>
>Vineland and M&D seem to shrug off the dark paranoia
>of the earlier works.

Or at least, the paranoid moments appear more out of place, less fundamental 
to the novels' structuring and more like leftovers (hangovers) of the 
earlier obsessions...Esp. in M&D, where I at least got the feeling that the 
Jesuit conspiracy stuff was not really played out that well, not as 
conducive to reflection and interpretation, more like a nice gloss to remind 
the reader who is being read here.

Not that these later throwbacks help us with the radically divergent 
interpretations of Pynchonian paranoia which we come across. I like the long 
post Dave Monroe sent, and although I don't totally agree with it, I think 
this guy has at least thought out his argument (I disagree with him when he 
starts to set up an Enlightenment/Western/Rationalist system vs. a 
Non-Rational/Eastern/Intuitive alternative, which is probably too much of a 
simplification of P's writings and I don't think that the novels set up such 
a neat binary opposition).

>
>I'm also a bit weary of the Pynchon and DeLillo
>connection. This made sense in the 70s, but Pynchon's
>work has lightened up a bit, whereas for the most
>part, DeLillo has continued to be the cold and
>abstract chronicler of modern times.
>

You got that right.

>It'll be interesting to see if the rumors are true,
>how Pynchon handles a love story in whatever comes of
>the Gottingen novel.
>

If the rumours which preceded Vineland & M&D are indicative, it's not much 
use guessing...

John

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