VLVL2 work

[Tim Strzechowski]

From: "jbor" <jbor at bigpond.com>

> Yes, I agree that Max Klinger from M*A*S*H* might have been Zoyd's model,
> and I also believe that it's a demented drag queen act rather than a
> demented housewife act, as I noted in my initial post on this thread.
>
> The other thing to consider is the self-referentiality of all of this. How
> much of what Pynchon himself does could be considered "work"? Is the
> publication of a new novel (him jumping through the window of a text in
drag
> as he had done with Oedipa Maas in 1966, perhaps) something which he is
> compelled to do (by the Ford Foundation Grant people or by his publishers)
> to keep the cheques rolling in? Is there an ironic self-consciousness of
his
> own ambivalent relationship with the culture and the government in his
> portrayal of Zoyd's (dishonest) way of earning a living?
>

To give the narrative a decidedly postmodern reading -- the
self-referentiality and author/character parallel -- is interesting, and one
I hadn't thought of before.  Nice job!

For me, however, I see more tradition in the narrative, its roots stretching
back to the ancient Greeks and their use of farcical characters onstage to
not only represent the yang to the yin of tragedy, but to likewise offset
the feelings of catharsis experienced by audience members of the tragedies.
When attending a tragedy (as you know) audience members were shown the
events and downfall of aristocratic and heroic figures, and the resulting
feelings of "pity" and "fear" impacted the audience by showing them how the
mighty have fallen and, if they themselves are not careful, the same might
happen to them lest they obey the gods.

Comedy, however, provided the antithesis of this audience reaction by
portraying ridiculous characters on stage, men dressed as women, figures
wearing prosthetic breasts or male organs, the slapstick, the wordplay, the
double entendres, the farce -- but in so doing, enlightened the audience
momentarily by showing them how silly, how ridiculous we humans can be.  In
effect, comedy elevated audience members to the status of the gods, who
could pass judgment on the silliness of those humans on stage.

It's that tradition, imo, that Pynchon draws upon mainly in his
characterization of dress-wearin', hair-rattin', chainsaw-wieldin',
window-jumpin' Zoyd Wheeler.

Respectfully,

Tim