Leslie Fielder wimps out

[tess marek]

--- Otto <ottosell at yahoo.de> wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "tess marek" <tessmarek at yahoo.com>
> To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Thursday, January 02, 2003 6:13 PM
> Subject: Re: Leslie Fielder wimps out
> 
> 
> > Is DeLillo is simply better than Pynchon?
> >
> 
> That maybe true or untrue, but I prefer to consider
> them as both playing in
> the same league, with Pynchon in the lead and Gaddis
> on No. 2.

> 
> > With each of his novels Don DeLillo has enhanced
> his
> > literary reputation and gained a wider audience.
> > Pynchon has not.
> 
> I'm not sure about that.

Well, it's certainly the case here in America.
DeLillo's reputaion with subway readers, best-seller
readers, high-brows, the critics, the yacademics is
up-up-and-away. I see his books out there. Believe it
or not I actually turn my disk-man off and put my
books and papers away and lean over and ask people,
"say, i was thinkin of reading that book, do you like
that book?" One woman told me that she would not read
DeLillo because he was being advertized as a great
writer. She was reading Lovely Bones and she convinced
me to read it. Hell, I couldn't get it at the library
so I bought a hard cover. Before my Pop had his brain
cut up the second time I tried to get him to read
Pynchon. My Pops is  smart, was a Jesuit, can talk
science and religion with the best of them, but he
never got round to reading Pynchon, but he couldn't
resist DeLillo cause the guys from the Bronx,
graduated from both Cardinal Hayes and Fordham. Pops
loved DeLillo. I think he would have loved M&D.
Anyway, Rich compared DeLillo to the rock bands of the
70s, but I don't think that's the best way to look at
it. I mean, Pynchon wants to be popular. You set out
to write books that will sell or at least your agent
or wife or whatever does.  Even Melville, that mad
poet who couldn't keep his wife in pumpkins and plumbs
and once wrote,  "It is my earnest desire to write
those sort of books which are said to 'fail'" tried to
sell his books and make a living at it. 
Pynchon, we know from his letters, wanted to sell,
wanted to win praise and prizes. It's interesting that
the Introduction to SL said little to encourage
readers to read his books. It's as if Pynchon writes
those sort of books that are said to "fail" (i.e.,
metaphysical) and if they suceed (CL49 and Entropy) he
can't accept it. I guess M&D is something of a
(publishing) failure and so is VL. VL was both
destined to be a dud after the screaming rockets in GR
and expected to be great after the long wait. It was
dud. M&D was also long in the pipe and disappointing
because it was not very fresh or unique. I think
MalignD said it best when he called it something like,
Sot Weed after the fact.  

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