VLVL2 (1): Narrator's Voice

[Terrance]

> 
> The one thing that leapt out at me after I read the introduction to Pale
> Fire one day and the first section of Vineland the next  day was the
> vocabulary levels.  As with GR and M&D, I needed the dictionary at hand
> as I read through the intro to PF.  Sure, most of the words were
> decipherable through context, and some were halfway familiar, but reading
> with the dictionary open for me adds another dimension of enjoyment to a
> work of literature.  The startling thing to me was that there were NO
> words that needed a dictionary in the opening section to Vineland.  I've
> read the book at least a half a dozen times before and this never crossed
> my mind, but I think this is where much of the disrespect that Vineland
> gets from Pynchon fans comes from, the fact that any reasonably read
> tenth grader could cruise through this novel.

If this were the case Pynchon fans would only prove their ignorance of
literature. 
But, having taught HS, I'd say you are playing with us here. A typical
10th grader complains that he is being made to read SHakespeare because
the language is so difficult. 




> 
> I found the narrator's voice in Vineland to be similar to that of the
> narrator in Gravity's Rainbow, a warm caring person aghast at the events
> he is describing.

Another joke? 


> 
> I think the cries that "Pynchon has lost it!" that were heard after the
> release of Vineland have to do with the vocabulary.  But it seems pretty
> clear to me that Pynchon made a conscious choice to write in a more
> vernacular tone.

Yeah, it was clearly a conscious choice. A good one too.