for pete's sake

[Kevin Troy]

"Man, what happened to you?  We used to be _beautiful_ together."
--Sam Jackson's character in _Jackie Brown_

I've been taking notes and doing research for several short notes -- or
maybe it will turn out to be one or two mid-length papers -- on PF and
Pynchon.  For example, I'd like to examine the connections between
paranoia and gnosticism in PF, Lot 49, and GR.  I guess my approach is
similar to the "short paper" thing Dave Marc proposed, but I don't know,
really, because I haven't actually done it yet....

But maybe I won't bother, now that the list has gone to hell.

Did Nabokov influence Pynchon?  You bet your sweet bippy he did.  Did PF,
specifically, influence Pynchon, in a way that is evident in his works?
Gee, I'd like to find out.  If that question is the general hypothosis of
the NPPF (it is for me, at least, your mileage may vary) then obviously
the first phase of the NPPF should be exploratory:  before demonstrating
or proving any PF-Pynch connection, one has to get a sense of PF and the
criticism surrounding it.

What Doug and (I'm surprised to find) Tim have been doing in the last few
days is the e-mail of equivalent of poking someone on the shoulder every
five minutes, asking "are we there yet?  Have we reached the Radiant Hour?
Huh?  Huh?"  This, Tim, alienates me, your friendly neighborhood
semi-lurker, far more than the prospect of an NP book being seriously and
systematically analyzed on pynchon-l.

Pynchon-l has the opportunity to do something really great.  We (by which
I mean "you suckers") have a choice of either

a)  Taking up the challenge and conducting simultaneous group reads of two
well-crafted and difficult books, each of which has different merits, or
b)  Kicking and screaming like a bunch of infants.

Your choice, kids.

Bye,
Kevin T.