Pynchon's intro to Been Down So Long

[Paul Nightingale]

I agree that the intro to Been Down So Long should be linked to that for Slow Learner; in each P reinvents himself retrospectively yet does so without insisting on the benefit of hindsight. So I have to disagree - he doesn't "[sentimentalise] his own earlier years". If anything, his attitude here to the past (as something to be written) is consistent with M&D: P is just as much an unreliable narrator as Wicks Cherrycoke. And he doesn't dwell on his actual relationship with Farina: he has very little to say about their time together. However, they are linked together, in many ways as opposites rather than soul twins.
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