political polarity and pynchon

[vze422fs at verizon.net]

on 2/16/03 7:33 PM, prozak at anus.com at prozak at anus.com wrote:

> 
> well, it's hard to speak as a relative unknown, because most people
> look at what i'm doing and figure my intent is blind provocation or
> insanity.
> 
> but, it seems to me the political topics are the most germaine to
> pynchon as we're going to get outside of reworking the ideas and
> complexities of well-researched pynchon writings. pynchon, writing
> during viet nam about the possibility of end of the world (trés cold
> war, nu?), was writing in many ways about the political split of
> humanity that involved distant symbols and had little to do with the
> task at hand. i believe there was something in V about this, how the
> right is hard facts and the left is all emotion.
> 
> to me, what is interesting ("philosophically") here is that despite
> the vast amount of highly polarized political agreement, most of us
> are coming at it from a liberal perspective. avoid bombing children.
> ensure rights and fairness to all. do the right thing. these kinds of
> grand symbols not only motivate crowds, but also make great framing
> for a movie if one is eventually made on this topic. in such, they
> represent the "pornographies" and "ikons" and "Word"(s) of pynchon's
> writing, at least GR and M&D.
> 
> does anyone else see a need here to remove politics from the abstract
> and universal and return it to the literal, regardless of the grand
> abstractions, sentiments and phrases we can pronounce?

Pynchon's subject matter, even in his naive voice, provokes political
discussion. Reading something like "Under the Rose" immediately provokes
questions about the setting and the surrounding history. Porpentine and his
opposite numbers are political animals in the purest state.

>For he and Moldweorp, Porpentine knew, were cut from the same pattern: comrade
Machiavellians, still playing the games of Renaissance Italian politics in a
world that had outgrown them (p97).

Cold war comparisons anyone?

British and German maneuvering in the Middle East leads to nation-making.
False borders cut across linguistic, religious, and ethnic lines; forming
unnatural alliances that can only lead to civil war.

Intelligence agencies playing by old rules, become chummy though still
murderous through professional courtesy and familiarity.

Oops. We're right back to Yugoslavia and Iraq.